53 



Some weeks before Grossularia echinella was formally (Je- 

 scribed, newsof the discovery ^oi into several Florida news[)a[)ers, 

 and led many people to imagine that because it was something 

 new it must necessarily be valuable (unmindful of the fact that 

 nearly all our food plants have been known for centuries, and 

 we did not even know at that time whether this gooseberry was 

 edible or not). This brought several requests from perfect 

 strangers for living plants, but naturally we did not care to 

 make such a long journey to accommodate them, and incidentally 

 contribute to the extermination of a very rare plant before it 

 was even named. Several people also bobbed up with stories of 

 gooseberries they had seen in other places not far away, but all 

 such reports proved to pertain to the genus Polycodium (Vac- 

 ciniaceae), the species of which are commonly known as goose- 

 berry in the South. 



A brief description of Grossularia echinella may be of interest 

 to readers who do not have access to Mr. Coville's publication. 

 It is a shrub three or four feet tall when full grown, with slender 

 arched stems which often take root where they touch the 

 ground. The leaves are much like those usual in the genera 

 Grossularia and Ribes, (palmately lobed, as in several other 

 families of Polypetalae), and there is a pair of sharp stipular 

 spines at ev^ry node. The ovary, calyx-tube or hypanthium 

 (as it is variously interpreted) when in flower is densely covered 

 with soft green spines, which as the fruit develops become larger 

 and farther apart, but hardly stiff enough to cause serious dis- 

 comfort if one wishes to bite into the berry. When full grown 

 the berry is about an inch in diameter, and somewhat inter- 

 mediate in appearance between a small chestnut burr and a 

 green jimson weed pod. It is the largest and spiniest of any 

 American species of the genus. The spines number perhaps 

 two or three hundred to the fruit, and are gland-tipped. 



Another peculiarity of this species is its leaf development. 

 According to Dr. Kurz, when he visited the place last October 

 the bushes were practically leafless, but new leaves were just 

 beginning to show. At the middle of December they were flat- 

 tened out and approximately half grown, just as they were in 

 February. So apparently the leaves remain half developed 

 through the winter and complete their growth in spring, unlike 

 any other deciduous shrub known to me. Just what effect a 



