Mutant Groups in Nature, Gentiana campestris var. alba

Abstract

PROF. JULIAN HUXLEY (NATURE, October 3, 1925, p. 497) may be glad to know that his example of mutant white-flowered Gentiana campestris has its analogue in Zetland. There, on the slopes of Whiteness Voe, is a very large group of white-flowered specimens, outnumbering the normal form, and I saw several good-sized patches in the remote island of Balta. There is also a considerable group on the slopes of Ben Lawers and on Glen Lyon. I saw no intermediates, although in the Isle of Wight there is a large colony of white Origanum and intermediates which are also almost certainly crosses of the white and normal plants. One might add that I brought a single red-flowered Kentranthus ruber to my garden about twelve years ago; seedlings came up and they remained constant, but last summer a white-flowered plant appeared. However, there seems to be a permanence in the white-flowered Gentiana campestris and in the albino Geranium Robertianum which continues for many years. It was very noticeable on one side of the Brazen-face outside Funchal; there it evidently seeded down the hill-slope.