52 



SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



BOT/INY'V 





Abnormal Primrose. — I send you some speci- 

 mens of flov.ers of Primula vulgaris vdth much 

 elongated tube to the calyx. Every bloom on this 

 plant is abnormal : it is g^o^\•ing in the garden. — 

 Francis Buckell, Park House, Romsey. 



Abnormal Lilac. — I send you a curioush" 

 abnormal specimen of white lilac from my garden, 

 3'ou will observe that several of the flowers show 

 deviation from the t}-pe. In one of them I make 

 out five corollas and ten stamens. — Maiiin J. 

 Teesdale, St. Margaret's, Thurlow Park Road, Dulwich ; 

 May 6th, 1896. 



Early Primroses in Aberdeenshire. — One 

 result of the mild season during the early part of 

 this year v.-as that I gathered primroses in flower 

 here on February- 7th. The flowers were both well- 

 formed and well-coloured, but rather below average 

 size. They have flowered on since that date and 

 have been showing superior flowers. — If. Wilson, 

 Alford, Aberdeenshire. 



Cyathus vernicosus in Ireland. — Mr. R. 

 Lloyd Praeger records the occurrence in a cold 

 greenhouse at Macedon, Belfast, of this small 

 birds'-nest fungus. It has been fotmd, year by 

 year, for more than twenty years in flowerpots 

 containing various plants. 



Abnormal Cotyledon umbilicus. — We have 

 received a remarkable spray of Cotyledon umbilicus 

 in which the stem is fasciated and about double 

 its ordinary thickness. The flowers are not directly 

 attached in the ordinary manner, but arranged 

 upon sixteen branches, some of them being nearly 

 as long as the chief stem. The termination of the 

 stem is blunt, with five of the shorter branches 

 arranged in loose rosette. The specimen v,-as fotmd 

 near Lynmouth, North Devon, by Mr. C. A. Briggs. 



Abnormal Feverfew. — I send you some shoots 

 of the common feverfew, which I think may 

 interest you. They are e\-idently meant to be 

 flowers, for you will be able to arrange them in 

 a series from an almost ordinarj- shoot to an 

 imperfect flower surrounded with leaves in the 

 place of bracts. They were picked off two plants 

 which have been moved twice (I think 1 during the 

 winter, which has been very mild here, no hard 

 frost or snow. Two calceolarias have lived out-of- 

 doors all the winter. — Frank Sich, jun.. Niton, Isle 

 of Wight. 



Pyrus japonica Fruiting. — The Cydonia or 

 Pyrus japonica bears fruit which ripens in the open 

 air at one place at least in co. Armagh. I know a 

 thatched house at Derryadd, Parish of Ardmore, 

 on the south shore of Lough Xeagh, about fifty 

 feet above sea-level, on the front of which is an old 

 plant of this shrub that each year is covered v.ith 

 bloom, and frequently brings quite a number of the 

 fruit to maturity. I lived for many years close to 

 this spot, and often saw and admired the ripe fruit, 

 and they were striking and beautiful objects. I 

 have not seen it fruit elsewhere. — H. W. Lett, 

 M.A., Aghaderg Glebe, Lcugkbrickland, co. Do'j.n. 



Rooks Swallowing Fir-Cones. — I have often 

 noticed rooks during a time of continued hard 

 frost working at the cones on Scotch firs, and I 

 have heard that on such occasions the rooks are 

 breaking up, vdth their strong bills, the green cones 

 to feed on the small seeds contained in them. To 

 my mind appearances were against the rooks 

 hacking the cones to pieces, for they seemed to 

 me to keep on the trees and to pass from one 

 branch to another when engaged in feeding on this 

 dehcac)'. So I took opportunities last winter of 

 paying close attention to them, and finding num- 

 bers busy on all the Scotch firs on my glebe, I 

 managed to get into an out-house close under a 

 fine large Scotch fir near my house ; and from 

 this post of obser\-ation, where I was only a few 

 yards from the birds, I satisfied myself that the 

 rooks did not break up the small green cones — 

 they touched no others — but swallowed them 

 whole. I saw them tugging at the cones, and 

 w-hen one was severed from a brand I distinctly 

 obsen-ed it being sv.allowed, I savv- the lump 

 formed by its passing down the bird's neck just 

 as one often sees in the case of ducks swallQ^'.'ing 

 small potatoes. And I have never fovmd any of 

 the green cones h"ing about with the marks of 

 the seeds ha^"ing been removed bj' the rooks. — 

 H. W. Lett, M.A..Lcughbrickland; May. 1896. 



Germin.ation of Double Cocoanut. — The 

 double cocoaxiut, though at one time very highly 

 prized as a natural curiosity, is probabh- now 

 familiar to many. From its restricted distribution 

 — only being fotmd indigenous in a fev,- of the 

 Seychelles Islands, a small group in the Indian 

 Ocean- — and the absence of inducements to its 

 cultivation ; it is scarcely, likely ever to become 

 very common. Its comparative scarcity, as well 

 as some of the attendant circumstances, give interest 

 to a case of the production of a fine plant from the 

 seed in the Victoria Regia house at Kew Gardens. 

 In June, 1892, a nut, i.e. the seed, v,-as to be seen 

 there, placed on earth in a pot, the seedling (v.-hich 

 emerges from the depression bet%veen the tv,-o lobes 

 forming the double nut), a fine young plant, v,-as 

 rooted in another pot near it, connection being 

 maintained by the stalk attached to the modified 

 cotyledon or haustorium -vithin the seed, which 

 absorbs nourishment from the endosperm and 

 convej-s it to the growing plant. At this time the 

 plant must have been of some age, probably at 

 least a j-ear old, judging from its size On a 

 subsequent visit in September, 1894, I noticed the 

 seedling had developed into a small palm, v.ith 

 several fine leaves from six to eight feet long. On a 

 recent occasion, in June, the parent cocoanut was 

 to be seen still connected vdth the palm to which 

 it had given birth four or five years before, although 

 no doubt all nourishment had been absorbed from 

 it some time pre\-iou5ly. The stalk now appears to 

 be woody, and, with the shell of the seed, might 

 continue to exist for several years, forming an 

 interesting and rare natural curiosity. — Jas. Burton, 

 9, Agamemnon Road, West Harnpstead. 



