Plants of Antrim and DownAuthor(s): R. Ll. PraegerSource: The Irish Naturalist, Vol. 22, No. 1 (Jan., 1913), p. 19Published by: Irish Naturalists' Journal Ltd.Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25524047 .

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1913* Notes. 19

Plants of Antrim and Down.

Mr. A. W. Stelfox has sent me recently two plants which are worthy of

notice in these pages. One is Saxifraga umbrosa, "

from a glen 2 J miles

N.N.E. of Hillsborough. It was in as natural a habitat as could possibly be imagined, but, as you will see, it is a garden variety of the species." This station matches one reported by Mr. Thomas Greer for Saxifraga Geum

?a wild, small glen in Co. Tyrone, along one edge of which, however, a

road ran. Both these Saxifrages are often grown in gardens, and they

possess great vitality, so that a piece thrown down may with luck take root

and grow ; probably these facts help to account for their occurrence in

several places where they cannot be considered native. Mr. Stelfox's

other plant is Arctostaphylos Uva-ursi, which he reports as growing in

some quantity on the side of a gully on Agnew's Hill, Co. Antrim. The

Bear-berry is extremely rare in the north-east, and had not been seen there

for over seventy years till re-discovered by Mr, Lilly (a single colony) at

Skerry whinny, in 1908.

R. Ll. Praeger.

Dublin.

ZOOLOGY.

Formalin as an Insecticide.

Owing to the remarkable efficiency of formaldehyde as a germicide and fungicide, some experiments were made in the plant houses of this

College to determine its insecticidal power. Various solutions of Schering's formalin in water were used, giving graded strengths of formaldehyde from .01 to 2 per cent. These were sprayed over plants infected with

green fly and mealy-bug. The results showed that any efficacy formalin

might possess as an insecticide was more than counterbalanced by its

injurious action on the plants.

J. Charles Johnson.

University College, Cork.

The Medicinal Leech in Ireland.

Dr. Scharff, in an article on "

The Irish Freshwater Leeches "

(Irish

Naturalist, vol. vii., 1898), refers to the occurrence of the Medicinal

Leech (Hirudo medicinalis) i Lough Mask, in 1849. The writer

has recently had occasion to refer to an article by P. L. Simmonds on u

The Trade in Leeches," in the Pharmaceutical Journal (3), i? 1870

(pp. 521-2), in which the following statement is made:?"Lord Desart

lately let a piece of marsh land of about 40 acres on his estate near Callan,

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