197 



describes, whether it is a lion charging upon him with the speed 

 of an express train, trees that strangled each other, or trees that- 

 dripped with honey when wounded. This observation was 

 instinctive with Theodore Roosevelt because he was a born 

 naturalist. 



SHORTER NOTES 



Heliaxthus besseyi Bates. — Helianthus besseyi J. M. 

 Bates was described in American Botanist, February, 1914, p. 17, 

 from specimens collected at Red Cloud, Nebraska. Last spring 

 Mr. Bates was kind enough to send me some of the tubers, which 

 I planted in my garden at Boulder, May 5. The tubers are 

 elongate-fusiform, and yellowish. Today (September 14) the 

 plants are past flowering, though the closely related H. alexandri* 

 a few feet away, is in full bloom. The plants are about 5 feet 

 high when well grown, and are strict, with comparatively few 

 fioriferous branches, entirely in the style of alexandri. The 

 stems are reddish and scabrous, as in alexandri, but rougher. 

 Leaves opposite, alternate above, as in alexandri. Leaves 

 subovate, conspicuously broader than in alexandri, and some- 

 what paler, the bases broad-cuneate, the petioles fairly long and 

 distinctly winged. As in alexandri, the upper surface is rough, 

 the lower soft-hair>% with the hairs on the midrib appressed. 

 The rays are orange, as in alexandri, but are much shorter, 

 about 30 mm. (in alexandri 41 mm. long and 14.5 wide). The 

 achenes are the same in both, but the disc-corollas of besseyi are 

 shorter, with paler lobes. The involucral bracts are spreading, 

 but short (about 9 mm. long, base of involucre to end of longest 

 phyllary about 12 mm.), with blackish bases (entirely pale green 

 in alexandri), and there is the appearance of an extra row. The 

 leaves are entirely dull above. The plant is quite distinct from 

 H. nehrascensis (Ckll.), which also occurs at Red Cloud, and 

 although it is close to the Michigan H. alexandri, it must evi- 

 dently be separated from it, having a number of salient charac- 

 ters. It adds one more to the assemblage of closely related 

 species grouping around H. tuberosus. 



* Helianthus tuberosus alexandri Ckll., Amer. Naturalist, LIII: i88; H. alex- 

 andti Ckll., Monthly Bull. Calif. State Comm. Hoiticulture, VIII: 249. (1919.) 



