AVRII. 25, 1888.] 



Garden and Forest. 



99 



The common Privet, one of the hardiest and most easily 

 cuhivated of plants, carries in this climate its bright black 

 fruit well into April. Several of our native Roses also re- 

 tain their showy red haws until spring, especially the tall- 

 growing Carolina Rose, and, among dwarfer species, T^osa 

 Iminilis, R. blanda and R. iiilida. The conspicuous fruit of 

 ovir native Bitter-sweet — orange-colored and red — remains 

 upon the plant all through the winter season, and its free 

 habit of growth will add a welcome touch of variety to the 

 group of shrubs among which it may be planted. The 

 Japanese Rhodotypus is another winter fruit-plant, although 

 its greatest beauty consists in its pure white flovi'ers and 

 neat foliage. And to this list of shrubs which do not lose 

 their fruit until the days when fresh foliage is ready to re- 

 place them, may be added many others which retain theirs 

 for at least a portion of the winter. The different Spindle- 

 trees are striking objects in late autumn and early winter; 

 but although their brilliant crimson fruit is persistent 

 through winter, it becomes dull and inconspicuous by the 

 end of the year. Few plants are more beautiful in autumn 

 than the Highbush Cranberry ( Vihtirniim Opuliis) with its 

 load of orange-scarlet fruit, but the birds devour this so 

 greedily that little is left at Christmas-time. Every one 

 knows the beauty of the Black Alder as it blazes through 

 our northern swamps during the autumn months, and al- 

 though a native of swamps it grows freely in any garden 

 soil. If planted for the sake of its fruit care should be 

 taken to secure plants of both sexes. Its scarlet fruit gen- 

 erally disappears by Christmas, but in his account, recent- 

 ly printed in these columns, of the effects of the great 

 spring storm in New Jersey, Dr. Abbott speaks of seeing the 

 Black Alder loaded with its fruit resting upon the dazzling 

 drifts of March snow. The Snowberries, white and red- 

 fruited, are beautiful in autumn, but they also lose their 

 beauty later in the year. 



And the winter shrubbery can be enriched by many 

 plants conspicuous by reason of their bark. Scarlet-twigged 

 Dogwoods, Golden-barked Willows, the Kerria \\\\\\ its 

 shining yellow branchlets and many others may be group- 

 ed with fruit-bearing plants to produce an effect of striking 

 and of lasting charm. All these plants are beautiful in 

 spring and summer as well as in winter, and some of them 

 are among the most desirable shrubs for summer-planting 

 that we have. Therefore it need not be thought that in 

 planting for winter beauty we should detract from our 

 pleasure at other seasons of the year. All we need to do 

 is, while planting for summer, to think a little of winter 

 too. A little thought will enable us without any sacrifice 

 in other directions to produce delicate combinations of 

 form and color upon which the eye will rest \vith satisfac- 

 tion throughout the long weeks of snow and cold. It is 

 ignorance or indifference rather than necessity that has led 

 us to rely so entirely upon dusky evergreen foliage in our 

 efforts after winter beauty. 



The death is announced of Jules Emile Planchon, the 

 distinguished Professor of Botany at Montpellier, at the 

 age of 65. Although a systematic botanist by training, 

 Planchon's predilections were for horticultural and economic 

 botany ; and of late years he has devoted himself specially 

 to the study of the Grape-vine, and of its greatest enemy, 

 the Phylloxera. He was sent to this country by the French 

 Government in 1873, to prosecute these investigations; 

 and on his return to Montpellier he made an interesting 

 and valuable report upon the subject. His last important 

 publication is a monograph of the Grape-vines and the 

 other plants of the Ampelopsis Family, in which some 

 new North American genera and several new North Ameri- 

 can species are proposed. This, the latest contribution to 

 the botanical literature of the Grape, occupies the second 

 half of the fifth volume of DeCandolle's Continuation of his 

 Prodromus, for which Planchon had written a monograph 

 of the Elms, Hackberries and other genera of the Nettle 

 Family. 



A Curious Vegetable Growth on Animals. 



IT is a well known fact that in certain diseases of the skin 

 and hair which occur in man and mammals there are 

 found fungi of rather a low grade of organization which by 

 many of the medical profession are considered to be the 

 cause of the diseases. In many of the lower animals, also, 

 parasitic fungi are found, so that the discovery of a new 

 fungus growing on animals would cause little surprise. 

 But the case is different in respect to alga3, lower plants 

 which, unlike fungi, have green coloring matter in their 

 cells. In a few animals which are low down in the scale 

 of existence green algoe are occasionally found, but, in such 

 cases, the algce are not usually considered to be parasites 

 in the ordinary sense. The algae and animals are assum- 

 ed rather to be living together in what is called a state of 

 commensalism — that is, the'algEe furnish in someway fiiod 

 for the animals while the latter provide food for the alga?. 



A curious case in which algae seem to live as parasites 

 on animals has recently been studied by Mme. A. Weber 

 van Bosse. It is a fact known to zoologists for some years 

 that the hairs of some of the species of sloths have a green- 

 ish color. It had been suspected and partly demonstrated 

 that the green color was due to some plant growth. Tlie 

 researches of Mme. Weber van Bosse show conclusively 

 that such is the case, and she descrilies minutely and figures 

 the species found in the hairs of j^nztfy^/zs and Clioioepiis. 

 The algas described belong to two genera — TricJtophihis, 

 in which the cells are grass-green and give out zoospores 

 like many small algae found in salt and fresh water and 

 also on trunks and trees in wet places; and Cyanoderma, 

 in which the cells are violet colored like some plants of the 

 Nostoc family. The home of the sloths is the damp, shady 

 forests of the tropics, and there M'e might expect such algse 

 to grow on animals of a sluggish habit, especially if they 

 live among the damp foliage of the branches, as is the case 

 with the sloths. But we should hardly expect that those 

 animals confined in the zoological gardens of Europe woukl 

 have their hairs covered by the same alga?. Such, how- 

 ever, appears to be the fact. 



W. G. Farlow. 



Last Year's Leaves. 



AS I walked yesterday along a wooded hillside, over 

 tree-margined fields, and skirted a swamp too wet, 

 as yet, to thread, I noticed many a tree with last year's 

 leaves still on it. Except one I'upelo, which usually drops 

 its foliage earlier than our other forest trees, these leaf- 

 bearers were all Oaks or Beeches. Thoreau speaks of 

 the White Oaks about Concord retaining their leave as 

 a rule, and others deny that this is true, or more than 

 an occasional occurrence. 



The conclusions derived from my own memoranda, cov- 

 ering many ysars, and of my ramble of yesterday partic- 

 ularly, are that not only the White Oak, but several other 

 species, do retain their leaves, or a considerable percentage 

 of them, until early in May of the next year. Take any 

 Oak grove in this neighborhood, and I think it will be 

 found, if the trees are not too crowded for healthy growth, 

 that fully three-fourths of them retain from one-tenth 

 to one-half of their leaves. But when we come to 

 consider single trees, this habit of leaf retention will be 

 found one of many curious features. For instance, I know 

 of many single trees, both Oaks and Beeches, that have a 

 single limb that will retain its foliage the winter through, 

 while the other branches are bare from November to ;\lay. 

 Again, a tree that stands upon the edge of a wood will hold 

 its leaves on the open, light and airy side, and drop those 

 that grew upon the shaded limbs. Does the greater vigor 

 of the foliage upon the sunny side explain this } 



In one of my upland fields there stands a thrifty Scarlet 

 Oak, that is noticeable for the beauty and density of its 

 foliage. In October the deep green becomes a rich ma- 

 roon, and later, a lighter and brighter red, and not until 



