XXXViii INTRODUCTION. 
As will be seen from the distribution given in the foregoing 
list, few of the species enumerated form a conspicuous element 
in the Kerry flora. Fully a third of the number, indeed, are 
restricted to one or two localities in the county, while those 
that occur in any abundance are chiefly aquatic or moisture- 
loving plants, such as Lobelia Dortmanna, so characteristic 
of the Kerry lakes, Eriocaulon septangulare, Drosera anglica, 
Scirpus rufus and Carex limosa. This hydrophytic tendency in 
the Scottish Type in Kerry is very well marked, 14 out of the 32 
species which occur being included under this heading. 
Several other members of this group present in other parts 
of Ireland are not definitely known to occur in the county. 
Amongst these may be mentioned—Savzifraga aizoides, 
Andromeda polifolia, and Polypodium Dryopteris, all with old 
but unrefreshed records for Kerry, and Parnassia palustris, 
the last named is widely distributed and generally abundant 
throughout Ireland, but is still unrecorded for Cork, Kerry 
and Co. Down. 
Watson’s remaining group, his Highland Type, or plants 
found chiefly on or about mountains, is proportionately as 
well represented in Kerry as the preceding. Out of a total of 
67 for Great Britain, 41 occur in Ireland, and of these 20 
species and 2 subspecies are found in the county. That nearly 
a third of the plants representing the extreme boreal element 
in the British flora should reach so far south as 52° in this 
county is remarkable, and is only partly accounted for by the 
fact that Kerry possesses the highest mountain ranges in 
Ireland. As elsewhere * pointed out, these mountains are so 
placed that latitude and the moderating influence of the 
adjacent ocean have combined to bring about, so far at least 
as temperature is concerned, probably the minimum of alpine 
conditions which could be produced anywhere in Ireland by 
mountain masses of equal elevation. 
That a moist equable climate in some way favours the exis- 
tence of northern forms is clearly seen when the number of 
Scottish and Highland Type plants occurring on the humid west 
side of Ireland is compared with the number found on the 
dry east side, allowances being made for differences in the 
elevation or latitude of the areas compared. Thus Kerry 
possesses 54 plants belonging to these two types, whilst 
Wicklow has only 36, and although the mountain ranges are 
more numerous in Kerry and rise about 400 feet higher, 
* Introduction to Cyb. Hibernica Hd. 11., p, xliii. 
