ROSACEA 409 



Bombus terrestris, B. lucorum, Calliphora erythrocephala, Musca do- 

 mestica, M. corvina and Eristalis tenax. 



Pyrus malus, Linn. Apple 

 Introduced,nodoubt,alongwith the pear. Polack (1831-37) speaks 

 of it as cultivated in European gardens. It is, however, nowhere 

 naturalised. In Europe the flowers are visited by Apis mellifica, Bombus 

 terrestris, B. hortorum, B. lapidarius, Calliphora vomitoria, Musca do- 

 mestica, Lucilia ccesar and Eristalis tenax. 



Cydonia vulgaris. Quince 

 Polack records it as in cultivation in European gardens (1831-37) 

 to the northward of the Thames River. My son, G. Stuart Thomson, 

 tells me that it grows wild on the river banks in some parts of the 

 Hokianga district. 



SAXIFRAGEiE 



Ribes Grossularia, Linn. Gooseberry 



Probably introduced early last century by the missionaries. First 

 recorded as an escape in Canterbury in 1871 by Armstrong. In 1877 

 Kirk recorded it as not unfrequent in forests in the Wellington dis- 

 trict, and added: "probably originating from seeds carried by birds." 



It is particularly common in the South Island, where it is carried 

 about by birds. In 1899 the bush about Moeraki contained a great 

 deal of it, and it has been since found abundantly and increasingly 

 about Dunedin and Otago Harbour, and wherever there are black- 

 birds and thrushes in the neighbourhood of settlement. The period 

 of germination of the seeds of Ribes is found to be hastened by passing 

 through the alimentary canal of a thrush. It is well known also that 

 seeds of a gooseberry are not digested by passing through the human 

 alimentary canal, but germinate freely from the faeces. 



W. W. Smith tells me that in Taranaki the roots of gooseberry 

 plants are very greatly damaged by the larvas (wireworms) of an 

 indigenous beetle (Ochosternus zealandicus). 



In Europe the flowers are visited by Apis mellifica, Bombus ter- 

 restris, B. lapidarius, B. lucorum, Eristalis tenax and Calliphora ery- 

 throcephala. 



Red and white currants {R. rubrum) and black currants {R.nigrum), 

 though introduced at as early a date — ^probably — as the gooseberry, 

 do not seem ever to have occurred even as garden escapes. Cockayne 

 reports it from Kennedy's Bush, Port Hills, Canterbury. 



Ribes sanguinea, Purch 

 Recorded by W. W. Smith in 1903 as naturalised in Ashburton 

 County. 



