THE YOUNG 



lost the power of independent existence 

 that its seeds will only germinate on 

 the tree on which it is to grow, and 

 they will only rot if sown in the ground. 

 The berries of the mistletoe are very 

 viscid, and are readily carried by birds 

 to neighbouring trees, where, whilst 

 cleansing their beaks as the manner of 

 birds is, they leave the see'ds adhering 

 by the sticky substance with which 

 they are surrounded. When the infant 

 plant begins to grow its roots incline 

 towards the centre of the branch on 

 which it is placed, and they soon 

 burrow through the tissues till they 

 reach the inner layers of the bark (the 

 soft bast and cambium), where they 

 literally suck np the life-blood of the 

 plant which sustains them ; in other 

 words, they intercept a portion of the 

 elaborated sap of the tree in its passage 

 from the leaves to the various portions 

 of the trunk. Thus the mistletoe lives 

 and grows and runs the whole cycle of 

 its existence without contact with the 

 ground at all. As a matter of fact, 

 when it touches the ground it dies, 

 and the great number of diverse plants 

 on which it can exist shows its long 

 persistence in the parasitic habit. 



Even more widely distributed and 

 represented in Britain by about half-a- 

 dozen species are the dodders (Cuscuta); 

 but, unlike the classic mistletoe, they 

 have no " history," hence they are only 

 recognised by botanists, and being 

 lowly plants are easily overlooked. 



NATURALIST. 51 



The dodders are slender, leafless, 

 thread-like plants, hence their common 

 name of "fairy's hair," or " lady's 

 laces," although the farmer observant 

 of their obnoxious qualities dubs them 

 " devil's guts/' an opprobrious name 

 shared alike by the twining stems of 

 the bindweed (convolvulus) . The long 

 twining stems of the dodder clasps the 

 surrounding plants on which it feeds 

 and inextricably interlaces them into 

 an entangled mass, thus choking and 

 strangling their growth, and speedily 

 killing its "host," usually herbaceous 

 plants, with its all too close embrace. 

 Its long, slender stems varying in 

 thickness from sewing-thread to whip- 

 cord in the different species, are quite 

 leafless, of considerable length, and 

 repeatedly branched; they vary in 

 colour — pink, yellow, white, — and the 

 small, sessile, fleshy flowers are usually 

 of the same hue; they are clustered 

 together in little button-like heads of 

 six or eight. The dodders are a de- 

 praved section of the N. 0. Convolvu- 

 lacecz, and although they have lost the 

 showy flowers of that order, they retain 

 the twining habit which characterises 

 its stems. The seeds contain a quan- 

 tity of albumen. They germinate in 

 the ground and the young plant grows 

 for some time until the reserve 

 materials in the seeds has become 

 exhausted. Then the twining stem 

 seizes hold of the stem of its adjoining 

 "host," when it speedily develops 



