Death's-Head Hawk-Moth at StrabaneAuthor(s): Andrew DohertySource: The Irish Naturalists' Journal, Vol. 1, No. 14 (Nov., 1927), p. 276Published by: Irish Naturalists' Journal Ltd.Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25531442 .

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276 The Irish Naturalists' Journal. [Vol. I.

DEATH'S-HEAD HAWK-MOTH AT STRABANE. On 16th September last a specimen of this moth was found on the

street here dying and brought to me. ANDREW DOHERTY. Butcher Street, Sirabane, Co. Tyrone.

TREE-WASPS' NEST INHABITED BY SPIDER. In September last I found here a small deserted nest of one of the

tree-wasps, Mr. Stelfox thinks it was probably that of Vespa sylvestris, in which a spider had made its home. (Miss) MONA O'CONNOR.

Ballyloughan, Bruckless, Co. Donegal. [Dr. A. R. Jackson, of Chester, identifies the spider as a rather large

female of Zilla atrica C.L.K., a species normally inhabiting trees and bushes.?Ed.]

MALE IRISH YEW.

By K. Lloyd Praeger, D.Sc, M.E.I.A.

The history of the Irish or Florencecourt Yew, so character istic of graveyards and formal terraces in our country, is well

known. A farmer named Willis found two young plants of this

upright form of the common yew on the mountains above Florencecourt, Co. Fermanagh, about 1780. One he planted in his own garden (it has long since disappeared); the ether was

planted at Florencecourt, the Earl of Enniskillen's seat, where it may still be seen. It wras propagated by cuttings, and all the Irish yews in cultivation have originated from this single Irish

plant. It is a female tree?the yew bears the male and female flowers on separate individuals?and in consequence all the Irish

yews in existence are also female, since cuttings merely repeat in all details the characters of the plant from which they are

taken. (The sex of the other original plant is not known.) In order to obtain fertile seed from the Irish yew the flowers must be pollinated, and the only pollen available is that of a male plant of the ordinary form. Seedlings appear practically always to revert to the type, though occasionally a seedling may have a trace of the fastigiate habit; a single exception is given by Elwes and Henry (Trees of Great Britain and Ireland, I, 110); in this case one seedling out of several was fastigiate like the Irish yew; its sex is cot on record. There is one record, unfortunately in

complete, of a male Irish yew, sprays with male flowers having been received by Dr. Maxwell Masters from Mr. Tillet, of Sprous ton, near Norwich, some thirty-five years ago (Gardener's

Chronicle, 3rd ser. x. (1891) 68) ; whether these came from a true male plant is not known, but common yew has been known

occasionally to produce flowers of both sexes. The circumstances

justify Mr. Elwes' pronouncement (I.e.) that no true male Irish

yew has ever been met with.

This being so, the discovery of male Irish yews in cultivation is of no little interest. The facts are fully set forth by Mr. W.

J. Bean, Curator of the Eoyal Gardens, Kew, in the Kew Bulletin for 1927, pp. 2f54-5. He writes that he has received shoots of

yew "

undoubtedly male and undoubtedly Irish "

from Mr. W. H. B. Fletcher, of Aid wick Manor, Bognor, Sussex. Mr. Fletcher reports finding these male Irish yews, of both the

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