FtTNCTIONS OF CLIMBING ROOTS OF IVY l4l 



Consequently I have much interest in drawing attention 

 to the photograph — reproduced on Plate lY., and taken in 

 January 1900 — of a Hedera helix clinging to the wall of the 

 gamekeeper's house at Overbury Court, Worcestershire, the 

 estate of R. B. Martin, Esq., M.P. It will be seen at once 

 that the stems — for there are two, though I am not sure 

 whether they represent two separate plants — have no earth 

 connection ; as, upwards of fourteen years ago, within my 

 own recollection, and upwards of eighteen within the keeper's, 

 they were completely severed about five feet from the ground, 

 the lower parts being uprooted and entirely removed, on 

 account of some building or drainage exigencies, leaving the 

 upper parts as represented. 



Nevertheless, the ivy has continued to flower, fruit, and 

 flourish, and even to make periodically climbing or spreading 

 shoots, which have to be clipped ; though very naturally 

 the vigour of the latter is clearly very much less than those 

 of another ivy on the same house in immediate contiguity, 

 which has not been interfered with, whose branches may 

 be seen to the right of the picture, touching — even mixing 

 with — those of my subject. 



Year after year I have visited this remarkable and interest- 

 ing ivy, or ivies, and have always found it difficult to 

 believe that during all that long succession of seasons they 

 could have lived on healthily — even to the annual production 

 of tissue, flowers, and berries — without something more than 

 water and carbonic dioxide from the air ; and for long I 

 was impressed with the conviction that something must 

 have been obtained from the oolitic limestone, or mortar, 

 of which the walls of the house are built ; in other words, 

 that the climbing roots must have responded to the abnormal 

 demands made upou them, and must have altered sufficiently 

 in structure to enable them, partially at all events, to 

 compensate for the absence of true roots. 



In order to determine to what extent that has been the 

 case, I obtained specimens of the climbing stem. A close 

 inspection revealed the fact that the masonry of the house 

 being rather loosely joiuted, the ivy had taken advantage of 

 the facilities offered by striking roots into the joints. 



The point is, are these roots true roots independent of 



