SCROPHULARINE^ 457 



of the Noxious Weeds Act, and their land has become nearly clean 

 by the plants dying out of the pastures. It is abundant in the Taieri 

 gorge. 



In Europe the flowers are visited by Bombus hortorum and B. ter- 

 restris. 



This species was included in the Second Schedule of the Noxious 

 Weeds Act of 1900 by Special Gazette Notice of 21st December, 1905 . 



Veronica agrestis, Linn. 



First recorded in Hooker's list in 1864, then by Kirk in 1877 as 

 "not unfrequently in cultivated land" in Wellington Province; com- 

 mon in the Auckland district in 1882. In the Manual (1906) it is 

 stated to be abundant in fields and waste places in both islands. 



In Europe it is visited by Apis mellifica. 



Veronica Buxbaumii, Ten. 

 First recorded in Hooker's list in 1864, and in most subsequent 

 lists of introduced plants, as plentiful in cultivated districts. First 

 noted in Otago by the author at Port Chalmers in 1885. In this 

 instance the plant came up where a quantity of immigrants' bedding 

 had been condemned and burned. Now found abundantly in culti- 

 vated land throughout all parts of New Zealand. It is a remarkably 

 strongly-rooted species. 



Veronica Anagallis, Linn. 

 When crossing the Ruahine Ranges in 1845, Colenso gathered 

 specimens of this species. In writing the account of it later he states 

 that: 



I noticed a Veronica with blue flowers which grew in the water and was 

 not unlike our English V. beccahunga or V. anagallis. (I mention this 

 particularly, as I fear it has of late years quite disappeared from this district, 

 not having seen a plant anywhere for more than twenty years.) 



Kirk (in 1869) doubted the accuracy of the identification, but 

 Cheeseman saw the specimens, which undoubtedly belong to V. Ana- 

 gallis, and he has included the species in his Flora as doubtfully 

 indigenous. I think there can be little doubt that it is an introduction. 

 It is remarkable, as Cheeseman states in his Flora, that the plant 

 should have apparently disappeared. But I may record a somewhat 

 similar instance. In 1870 in a field of newly broken up land in South- 

 land, sown with grass-seed imported from Lawson and Sons, of Edin- 

 burgh, there came up and flowered several plants of Veronica Chamce- 

 drys, Linn. The field was not grazed the first year, but a light crop 

 of hay was cut off it. The plant never re-appeared. I am inclined to 

 think that no insects capable of fertilising the flowers being available 



