Notes on the Pollination of some South African Cycads. 263 
Insects, viz., weevils of the genus Phlseophagus, visit the male cones 
and thereafter, while pollen is still adhering to their bodies, the females 
visit the ovulate cones most probably to ovipost. 
It would appear, therefore, that while nothing in the structure or 
position of the cones renders anemophily impossible or even improbable, 
entomophily is of common occurrence. 
Encephalartos villosus, Lehm. 
This species, which appears to reach its western limit somewhere near 
the Keiskama Eiver, is confined to the macrophyllous woods and forests 
of the httoral belt. Of the eight South African species of Encephalartos 
which I have seen growing in their natural habitats, it is the only one 
which is distinctly a shade-loving plant. When brought from the forest 
and subjected to the greater insolation of the open garden or park the 
long, graceful leaves become stunted and assume a sickly yellowish-green 
appearance. 
Around East London it is very abundant in the wooded ravines and 
forest belts which fringe the lower reaches of our larger rivers. Although 
the character and composition of these woods are by no means uniform, 
they are for the most part extremely dense save where man has entered 
with his pruning axe. Eecently the main road which passes through part 
of the Fort Grey forest has been widened by clearing away the vegetation 
on both sides, and it is almost impossible to conceive a more impenetrable 
barrier than that presented by the margin of the standing forest, yet in the 
stillness and gloom of this area E. villosus may be found in abundance in 
all stages of growth and development — indicating that neither wind nor 
direct sunlight are indispensable to its propagation. 
Subdividing the accessory vegetation of a forest flora into " under- 
wood " and "herbaceous undergrowth," our species may be regarded as 
belonging to the latter in so far as it produces no aerial stem, and the 
organs of reproduction seldom attain a height of more than 2 feet above 
the level of the soil. 
Almost without exception the other plants associated with it whose 
flowers attain approximately the same height, are markedly entomo- 
philous. Of these by far the most abundant in the locality mentioned are 
species of Acanthacese and Labiatse, belonging to the genera Isoglossa and 
Justicia in the one case and Salvia and Plectranthus in the other. 
The frequency with which cones are produced under natural conditions 
has not yet been determined. None were observed during the period 
1904-1906. In 1907 they were produced in considerable abundance in 
the Gonubie, Nahoon, and Buffalo valleys. Plants which I marked as 
coning in that year have up to the present (1912) not again developed 
