Introducing Something New 117 



flower is bright yellow with a delicate texture. A native of 

 Europe like the trefoil, it is of more aristocratic origin, for it 

 did not arrive in steerage but is unquestionably an escape 

 from the gardens of Seattle where it has been cultivated. My 

 attention was first called to it by a botanist whom I was 

 taking on a tour of inspection of the marsh. On this early 

 spring day the cattails were still brown but the much broader 

 leaves of this iris formed a clump which stood waist-high 

 and green. It brought forth lovely flowers a few weeks later 

 and my friend placed it as Iris pseudacorus, a native of the 

 Old World. Its subsequent history shows clearly the hazards 

 of such casual introductions and the narrow margins which 

 lie between failure and success. A short time after it bloomed, 

 the muskrats found its leaves to their liking. Before they had 

 found other equally, or more, palatable food they had left so 

 little vegetation that the plant seemed doomed. Yet it put 

 out more leaves and began to grow and prosper until the 

 heavy fall rains raised the lake level sufficiently to pull its 

 roots nearly out of the bottom, with the result that when 

 there was a breeze it would rise and fall with the waves as 

 if it were floating free. In some way it again became anchored 

 firmly, successfully survived the winter, withstood another 

 attack of the muskrats, flowered plentifully, and since then 

 it has increased in size until the plant or group of plants is 

 now more than a yard in diameter. This year I have discov- 

 ered, with much pleasure, that there are now three more 

 stations so that the chance of its complete establishment is 

 much more certain. Only one thing might prevent this hand- 

 some yellow iris from becoming a permanent decoration in 

 the marsh— it is the first green to appear in the area and as 

 such it may be attacked severely each spring by the muskrats. 

 Another type of introduction, though less interesting than 

 the two preceding, was used in establishing the water lily in 

 the marsh. The canoehouse manager informs me that these 

 introduced lilies came from a small artificial basin of water 



