232 PLANTS, SEEDS, AND CURRENTS 



or less fleshy shrubs cannot withstand the hurricanes and gales. 

 They are not able, as in the cases of the two plants just named, to 

 maintain their position by at first growing prone and sending down 

 secondary rootlets into the sand. On the southernmost and most 

 exposed island of the group, Greater Sand Cay, an island that is 

 wind-swept to a degree not easily realised without a sojourn in these 

 tempestuous seas, and one that is often breached by the breakers 

 in several places during storms, this plant was scarcely represented 

 when I visited it in March 1911. A few young plants grew on the 

 weather side, and there were some seedlings growing amongst the 

 stranded drift. The presence of a few goats on the island may 

 partly explain this ; but, as shown below, the much hardier bushes 

 of Suriana maritima have suffered severely in recent storms, and 

 much of the vegetation growing on the beaches was swept away 

 under the combined influence of wave and wind during the last 

 hurricane. 



On Grand Turk, the largest island of the group, the plant was 

 common in places on both coasts. It was thriving on Gibbs Cay, 

 ascending the sandy slopes some twenty or thirty feet; but I did 

 not observe it on Round Cay. On the rocky islands of Long Cay, 

 Pear Cay, and Penniston Cay, where beaches are absent or scanty, it 

 did not come under my notice at all ; and the same may be said for 

 Eastern Cay. On Cotton Cay I did not see it; but only a portion 

 of its coast was examined. On Salt Cay it did not often present 

 itself; but I found it flourishing near its southern extremity. On 

 Greater Sand Cay, as already observed, it barely existed. This 

 completes the list of the islands of this small group. 



We come now to discuss the dispersal of this plant by birds and 

 by currents, and in these respects we will compare it with Sccevola 

 Kcenigii. There is no doubt that the fruits of both plants can be 

 distributed by birds as well as by the currents ; but, as has already 

 been pointed out, whilst the bird would be an effective agent in 

 local dispersal, as from island to island within the same group, it 

 is to the current that we must look for the agency concerned in 

 distribution over the breadth of an ocean. The importance of the 

 bird in the case of Sccevola Plumieri is emphasised by Dr. Millspaugh 

 in his paper on the Florida keys, where he remarks that " the black, 

 pulpy fruits of this plant form a very attractive food for land birds ; 

 it thus becomes scattered far throughout the Antillean region " 

 (p. 240). This is also the opinion of Krause, who would exclude the 

 possibility of current agency altogether (p. 14). However, neither 

 Millspaugh nor Krause refer to the results of any flotation experi- 

 ments, and the former was surprised when I showed him in the Turks 

 Islands a cup of sea- water in which the " stones " of Sccevola Plumieri 

 had been floating for several weeks. The bird for local distribution 

 and the current for oceanic transport : this was the conclusion 

 formed concerning Sccevola Kcenigii by Schimper and myself. It 

 applies also, as my West Indian results indicate, to Sccevola Plumieri. 



In both cases the fruits, or rather their " stones," are able to 

 float in sea- water for months, and in that of Sco3vola Kcenigii for a 

 year or more, the seeds remaining fresh and, when tested, retaining 



