Insects and Flowers 
gardeners know to their cost. The same may 
said of the pimpernels. In this connection it 
is important to bear in mind that the anemo- 
philous, or wind-fertilised, angiosperms, as, for 
example, the grasses, are believed to be de- 
scendants of insect-fertilised or entomophilous 
forms. 
A weighty objection to the theory that the 
colours of flowers have been developed because 
they attract insects has been urged by Mr E. 
Kay Robinson, namely, that among wild flowers 
the most highly coloured ones are the least 
attractive to insects. 
“Show me,” writes he, on page 222 of The 
Country-Side for March 20, 1909, ‘the insect- 
collector who will seek for specimens among the 
brilliant scarlet poppies. Of what use is the 
dog rose, with its large discs of pinky-white, 
to him? On the other hand, does he not find 
that by far the most attractive flowers are the 
almost invisible spurge laurel blossoms in 
February and March, the fuzzy sallow catkins 
in March and April, the bramble blossom in 
midsummer, and the ivy’s small green flowers 
in autumn? Of these only the bramble has any 
pretensions to colour, and if you try, as I have 
tried, the experiment of picking off every petal 
from sprays of bramble blossoms you will find 
that its attraction to moths does not appear 
diminished. 
261 
