Page:The Journal of Indian Botany.djvu/454

32 THE JOURNAL OF INDIAN BOTANY.

The plant varies a good deal as regards the size of the leaves and their hairiness.

As collected here the plant was about 6 — 8 inches in height. It was thickly covered with stiff and stinging hairs The root stock was thick about § inch in diameter, soon divided into several rather stout lateral root-branches about 1 — 2 feet long and spreading obliquely. The leaves were tripartite to the base with narrow and divided lobes which were about an inch long and §- inch broad. The plant was not in flower or fruit.

Thus the hairiness of the leaves had increased and their size was reduced to at least I — i the size to be found in favourably placed plants.

9. Echinops echinatus Roxb,— This prickly plant with cot- tony under surface of the leaf is very common in the tract. It was found on light grey coarse soil (murum) on uncultivable land. The soil round the roots contained 1.55 per cent, of available moisture.

The plant only shows some little variation as regards the size it attains in different situations, and in the present instance it only showed a slight reduction in the same. Its root was a tap root 6 — 8 inches long and | inch in diameter devoid of lateral branches.

10. Leptadenia reticulata W. £ .4. — This was found in medium black or brownish soil of rather sticky character, at Belapur, on May 7, 1919. The soil round the roots contained 2.33 per cent, of available moisture.

The plant varies a great deal as regards the size of the leaves in various situations. The leaves have accordingly become very small in the present instance. They only attained f — 1 by | — inch. The plant was peculiar in having a root about lu feet long and — § inch in diameter. The root stock was about an inch and a half in dia- meter and gave rise to several branches of the stem. The root spread horizontally about six inches below the surface of the soil and had a few long and slender branches. The old root and the old part of the stem had a rough and deeply cracked corky bark. The leaves of this plant are used as a vegetable in times of scarcity by the poorer people.

11. Cucumis trigOilUS Roxb.— This was found in medium black, sticky soil at Belapur, on May 7, 1919. The soil round the roots contained 2'59 per cent, of moisture.

The plant seems to vary much as regards the length of the branches and the size, division and hairiness of the leaves, in differ- ent situations.

In the present instance also the size of leaves is reduced to | — | pf the usual size and their division and hairiness seem to be more