272 



SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



Notes % 



Moss Exchange Club. — It is proposed to form 

 an exchange club for mosses and hepaticse, some- 

 what on the lines of the existing exchange clubs 

 for flowering plants. Any persons willing to join 

 such a club are invited to send in their names to 

 Rev. C. H. Waddell, Saintfield, Co. Down. 



Notes of a Home Naturalist.— Mrs. Climen- 

 son, at the end of the first column on page 242 

 (ante), describes an animal under date 27th 

 September, with which she is not familiar. I 

 think the description clearly indicates Hydra fusca. 

 The features agree well with the Polype. — W . 

 H. Nunney, Bloomsbury, London, W.C. 



Memory of Bees. — On August 16th we took a 

 quantity of honey in frames from the tops of the 

 hives (super honey). The hives are in an orchard 

 at the bottom of the garden. When cleared of 

 bees the frames of comb are usually carried through 

 the garden to a disused cottage at a distance of 

 seventy yards from the nearest hive. On arriving 

 here we found a number of bees, which haA preceded 

 us, flying round the cottage awaiting the arrival 

 of the combs, which, however, still remained in 

 the clearers in the orchard. No honey had been 

 taken since June 21st last, and no bees had been 

 noticed near the cottage in the interval. — W. A. 

 Gain, Tux ford, Newark ; August, 1895. 



White Variety of Common Centaury. — 

 When botanizing on the Somersetshire coast 

 between Clevedon and Portishead, in the latter end 

 of August, 1895, I found several plants of Eryihraa 

 centaurium bearing perfectly white flowers. I have 

 consulted several of the standard British Floras, 

 but can find no mention made of this variety. I 

 should be glad of any information on this subject. 

 The plants bearing the white flowers were growing 

 under perfectly natural and favourable circum- 

 stances, in fact several plants with corollas of the 

 normal colour were growing near them, so that 

 there seemed no probability of the white colour 

 being the result of weak growth of the plant. — 

 Alan P. Gardiner, 32, Upper Belgrave Road, Clifton, 

 Bristol; January 2nd, 1896. 



Winter Exhibitions. — A paragraph on page 167 

 of this volume explained a scheme for circulating 

 sets of lantern-slides amongst Natural History 

 Societies. This plan has since been worked out 

 successfully. A set of fifty slides was got together 

 illustrating the geology of South-Eastern England, 

 and is now circulating among the contributing 

 societies. The work for next winter is to photo- 

 graph in greater detail the Upper and Lower 

 Greensand and Gault-beds in the South-East of 

 England. The possibility of carrying the idea 

 still further, of bringing about co-operation in 

 other subjects, is to be considered at a Congress of 

 Natural History Societies to be held at Tunbridge 

 Wells on April 25th, under the presidency of the 

 Rev. T. R. R. Stubbing. Imitations can be 

 obtained, with other particulars, on application to 

 George Abbott, 57, Pantiles, Tunbridge Wells. 



Edible Fungi in Winter.— On Christmas-day, 

 1S95. my brother and I, in company with Mr. John 

 T. Carrington, gathered a number of specimens of 

 Agaricus personalis on the chalk downs near Leather- 

 head, in Surrey, The}- were of good flavour when 

 cooked. This species has been very scarce in 1895, 

 as it also was in 1893, after the summer drought 

 of that year. — T. H. Briggs, Surrey House, Leather- 

 head. 



Abnormal Plantago Major. — Regarding the 

 abnormal forms of Plantago major wmich have been 

 recently spoken of in Science-Gossip (ante pp. 178 

 and 248). You will, perhaps, allow me to mention 

 that with the two forms grown in gardens as 

 curiosities, one is more leafy than the other. They 

 reproduce themselves by seed, and by far the 

 greater number of the seedlings present the 

 abnormal formation of the parents. I have one of 

 these forms in rax garden, and hope to have the 

 pleasure of sending you a specimen next season. 

 Another interesting variety of the same plant is 

 one with purple leaves, almost as deep in colour as 

 some of the dark-leaved beets, but not so glossy on 

 the surface. This also comes, to a considerable 

 extent, true from seed, although there is a great 

 tendenc5 r to revert to the green leaf of the type, a 

 proportion of the seedlings being inferior in depth 

 of colouring. — S. Arnott, Rosedene, Carsethom, by 

 Dumfries, N.B. 



Water-boatmen. — I have read on pages 232 and 

 233 of Science-Gossip, a very interesting and 

 charming article, entitled " Notes of a Home 

 Naturalist." Your correspondent enquires as to 

 three curious water-boatmen, and from the very 

 perfect description given, there need be no hesita- 

 tion in at once informing her as to their identity. 

 I have little doubt but that the insects described, 

 belong to the family Hydrodromica, the generic 

 and specific names being Velia airrens. Fab. They 

 are very common in streams in an immature form, 

 but to find them fully developed is extremely rare. 

 For a full description, I would refer your corres- 

 pondent to pgge 571 " British Hemiptera," one of 

 the Ray Society's works, by J. W. Douglas and 

 J. Scott, published 1865, or to a later work still, 

 " Synopsis of British Hemiptera - Heteroptera," 

 by Edward Saunders, F.L.S. (from the " Transac- 

 tions " of the Entomological Society of London, 

 1875 and 1876), page 641. — T. R. Billups, Swiss 

 Villa, Coplestone Road, Peckham. S.E. 



Habits of Bats. — Can anyone inform me if 

 bats migrate ? Some time ago — last May, in fact 

 — while out fishing on the lower Stour at Canter- 

 bury, I observed towards dusk an unusual number 

 of large bats, probably the long-eared bats (Plecotus 

 auritus), flying about overhead. I should judge 

 there must have been over tw-o hundred individuals, 

 and owing to the entire absence of suitable trees 

 and other places of shelter during the day, all 

 along the Stour valley, I am inclined to think it 

 may have been a migratory movement. I am 

 especially led to this belief as I failed to see any 

 sign of the number on the following night, or since. 

 — H. Mead-Briggs, 37, Nunnery Fields, Canterbury; 

 December, 1895. I Q No. 17 of "The Annals of 

 Scottish Natural History," page 58, published after 

 Mr. Briggs' question was in print, Mr. Symington 

 Grieve, of Edinburgh, asks the question " whether 

 Daubenton's bat (Vespertilio daubentont) migrates. 

 He states that in the crevices of some rocks on 

 Loch Dochart, in Perthshire, there were many in 

 July, in the breeding season, but at the end of 

 September they had all disappeared. — Ed. S.-G.] 



