330 Lees : Wetkerby Re-visited by Yorkshire Naturalists. 



Phyllobius oblongus L. 



The botanical scouts formed a thin, perspiring" line of six or 

 seven, their route from the new station cutting- having been 

 already indicated. Fifty species of plants or so were seen in 

 flower — the only novelty was Centaurea nigra var. radiata, the 

 ray-floretted form of the "common Horse-knop — a plant with 

 more common or garden aliasses than almost any other in the 

 vernacular. Not such a calcifuge (lime-shunner) as the Fox- 

 glove, it is yet always finest and most rayless on stiff or sandy 

 soils, upon limestone tending", in the frequency with which it 

 arrays itself, to the style of its handsome congener (C. scabiosa). 

 In this I see a hint at some hybridic influence, for C. scabiosa is 

 a true xerophile, lime-lover, not occurring on cold sandstone 

 soil. Field botanists of late years have shown many more 

 ' varieties ' to be really hybrids than was even suspected up to 

 1870. Knautia arvensis, the ' Gipsy Rose ' of the Ainsty, and 

 quite the favourite buttonhole of the young Romany for its 

 lasting rosette-like quality, was in unaccustomed profusion of 

 lavender and mauve, on and in the neighbourhood of the old 

 Race-course ings. The ' W ater-Thyme ' — who manufactures 

 these inept names, one wonders — the botanic ' book-makers ' ? — 

 in the Wharfe bending about the same arena, was seen in 

 blossom, exserting the long-as-needed tube of its $ flower 

 above the unusually low surface-level of the water. This was 

 another not previously recorded observation. The abbreviated 

 £ flower, produced where this American water-w r eed (Elodea 

 canadensis) creeps over laved mud, has not been found in 

 Yorkshire, but it is conceivable that a tropical season with an 

 extremely long drought may sometime produce it, as the plant 

 is not truly and fully dioecious — the sexual organs <$ and $ 

 borne on distinct plants ; every joint of a plant will multiply 

 under ordinary conditions of water-warmth, and the female- 

 flower envelopes contain staminal filaments which are abortive 

 - — vice versa, with the male-blossom style, which, however, 

 I have not actually seen. 



The- full lists of the Sectional Secretaries are not worth the 

 space they would occupy. No species but those 'named were 



Crepidodera ferrug-'mea Scop. 

 Plectroscelis concinna Marsh. 

 Cassida viridis F. (larva). 

 Anthicus floralis F. 

 Apion apricans Herbst. 

 Apion virens Herbst. 

 Sciaphilus muricatus F. 



Phyllobius viridiaeris Laich. 

 Mec'mus pyraster Herbst. 

 Cionus scrophulariaj L. 

 Cionus blattariae F. 

 Cceliodes quadrimaculatus L. 

 Ceuthorrhynchus pollinarius Forst. 

 Rhinoncus perpendicularis Reich. 



Naturalist, 



