BOTANY FOR BEGINNERS— III. 



THE STAMENS. 



The stamens will always be found in a circle in the 

 centre of the flower. They will be recognized at once as 

 thread-like bodies, each with a little knob at top (fig. 



8, a). The stem 

 or threadlike por- 

 tion is called the 

 filament and the 

 knob, the anther. 

 The principal use 

 of the filament 

 seems to be that 

 of holding the an- 

 ther in such a po- 

 sition that its pollen will be scattered to advantage. In 

 the pistil the style performs a similar service for the stig- 

 ma by holding it in a proper position for pollenation and 

 just as in some cases the style may be missing, so too, the 

 filament may be without loss to the effectiveness of the 

 blossom. In that common but interesting plant, the 

 water-carpet ( CArj^sosp/eijiuiij Americanum) th^ filaments 

 are so very short that the anthers appear to be without 

 stalks. 



The anthers are two-celled bodies in which the pollen 

 is produced. At maturity the anther cells open allowing 

 this pollen to escape (fig. 8, h). Although the pistils are 

 the parts of the flower that bear the seeds, they are useless 

 without the stamens, for no matter how advantageouvsly 

 they may otherwise be situated, they cannot produce seed 

 unless some of this magic pollen falls upon their stigmas. 

 The anthers usually open by a slit lengthwise of the an- 

 ther-cell much as a pea pod opens, but certain species have 

 modified even this process. In the heath family, the win- 

 tergreen, azalia, shin-leaf, blueberry and other familiar 

 species have anthers which open by a round pore at the 

 tip (fig. 8, d) and in the barberry, witch-hazel and sassa- 

 fras they open by tiny lids (fig. 8, c). The anthers are 



Fig. 8. Forms of stamens. 



