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frost does not get to their roots. I am sure that all plants, hardy 

 or not, are the better for this ; and I would mulch afresh in the fall, 

 that the roots may have a winter covering. As herbaceous plants 

 will repay good food given them, I would mulch with manure in 

 the fall. Let it be long manure, the better to protect the plants ; 

 the strawy portion can be raked off in the spring; the remainder 

 can be left undisturbed. It will be loose, and often it will be suffi- 

 cient mulching for the surface. — Medians' Monthly. 



FAIRY RINGS FORMED BY THE FLOWERING FERNS 

 Mr. T. C. Buchheister recently called my attention to the fact 

 that the various species of flowering fern (Osmnnda) not only 

 produce their fronds in circular crowns, but that the different 

 plants are themselves arranged in larger circles. In a recent trip 

 of several miles through a country where these ferns grow in 

 abundance, I improved the opportunity to put this matter to the 

 test and was surprised to find that the plants are rarely disposed 

 in any other form where the conditions permit them to develop 

 naturally. Walking into a thicket of the plumy fronds, one finds 

 himself surrounded by a fairly regular circle of the plants. So 

 here we have another form of the "fairy ring," if it is per- 

 missible to associate such tall and sturdy plants with the fairies. 



Dr. Robinson, in RJiodora, has noted similar fairy rings in 

 Lycopodium inundatum and explains them upon the supposition 

 that the different plants move outward from the centre in search 

 of fresh soil and new food supplies, and so eventually form the 

 circles. This explanation, owing to the way in which the ferns 

 grow, would seem scarcely to answer for the Osmund a circles. It 

 is more likely that each is the progeny of a single plant which has 

 given off branches from time to time, all of which moved outward 

 from the place of origin. It was noted that a line through the 

 plants in a clump made an oval rather than circular figure, and it 

 is conjectured that the original plant started at the broad end of 



