YORKSHIRE NATURALISTS' UNION. 



EEPOET ON YOKKSHIRE BOTANY for 1880, 



PREPARED FOR THE 

 BOTANICAL SECTION OF THE YORKSHIRE NATURALISTS' UNION, 



By F. ARNOLD LEES, 

 M.R.C.S.Eng., L.R.C.P.Lond., F.L.S., etc.; of Warrington. 



The observations made — the readiest rough test of the work 

 done — during the season of 1880, at the six meetings (Hackfall, 

 Malton, Barnsley, Boston-Spa, Marsden and Market Weighton) 

 are not so imposing numerically as those of 1879. The total 

 records in all classes of plants have numbered 1377, relating to 

 733 different species: as against 2054, involving 970 distinct kinds 

 of plants, in 1879. In part this is accounted for by the wet and 

 generally unpropitious season of 1880, but not a little is also due 

 to a somewhat stricter practice as regards the inclusion, or rather 

 exclusion, of observations made by ^<?;2-Unionists amongst the 

 botanists of the county, at other than Union excursions, by which 

 the numerical summary ceases to be swelled with records to which 

 the Union can strictly lay no claim. 



So far as Phanerogams and Vascular Cryptogams are con- 

 cerned, 949 observations have been registered, in which total 

 some 544 species are concerned: the figures respectively for the 

 previous year being 1396 — 623. And yet in the interest and 

 importance of individual records the year compares more than 

 favourably with 1879. 



Foremost in the call for mention is the new form of Sedge — 

 a variety new to the European as well as the British flora — with 

 the further distinction of having come from a West Yorkshire 

 station. This species — Carex saxumbra Lees — was first gathered 

 by myself, growing on overhanging sandy ledges and out of clefts 

 of tree-shaded red-gritstone rocks by the 'lake' at Plumpton near 

 Knaresborough. The affinities of this latest addition to our flora 

 are with Carex pilulifera (of which it is at the least a very marked 



Trans. Y.N.U., 1880 (pub. 1882). Series E 



