Winter Fertilisation

Abstract

IN the first number of NATURE, (for Nov. 4, 1869,) I ventured on a hypothesis, founded on a series of observations, that plants which flower in the winter have their organs of reproduction specially arranged to promote self-fertilisation. The following fact, which has just come under my notice, appears to confirm this theory. Plants belonging to the order Caryophyllacæ are, as a rule, strongly protandrous (see my paper in the Journal of Botany for October 1870), the anthers discharging their pollen at so long an interval before the maturing of the stigma as to render cross-fertilisation almost inevitable. The other day, Oct. 21, I came across a late flowering patch of Stellaria aquatica Scop., in which the anthers were discharging their pollen simultaneously with the maturing of the stigmas, each of the five styles being curled in a singular manner round one of the stamens, so as to bring the stigmatic surface in actual contatct with the dehiscing anther. This occurred in several flowers that were just opening, and there was abundance of seminiferous capsules on the plants.