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POSIDONIA FIBRE. 
| Posidonia Fibre. 
A Valuable Raw = oe Interesting Research 
Material. © Work. 
By “BIOLOGIST.” 
An extensive Bulletin (No. 15; 60 pages and 20 plates) has just been 
issued by the Institute embodying the results of investigations on 
Posidonia Fibre by Professor John Read (Sydney University) and 
Henry G. Smith (Sydney Technological Museum). ie Os 
Posidonia Fibre is derived from the fibrous portions of the leaves and 
stems of the submerged marine plant Posidonia australis, Hook, f. 
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. PORTION OF A LEAF. ©. 
Posidonia australis, Hoox, f. (N.O. Naiadacee). 
Showing how the fibre bundles occur mostly below the epidermis in a regular 
row, with a few towards the centre of the acrenchyma. X 35. 
(N.O. Naiadacew). This plant is apparently endemic in Australia, 
and occurs in immense deposits in the shallow coastal waters of 
Spencer’s and St. Vincent’s Gulfs. It has been recorded from the fore- 
shores of Western Australia, Tasmania, and-~New South Wales, and 
probably extends round the whole continent, but is worked at two places 
only—(1) from Point Riley to Port Davis, a distance of 50 miles near 
the head of Spencer’s Gulf; and (2) for a similar distance north of Port 
Adelaide to Port Wakefield. A large part of the deposit usually con- 
sists of the old stems with their bases covered with the filamentous 
remains of the old leaf ‘sheaths. The main living leayes are long. (14. to 
3 feet), and narrow (about } inch) with rather numerous longitudinal 
iss =. 37! : 
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