ESSEX PLANT NOTES FOR 1958
165
Gloucester, became Chaplain to the Dowager Duchess of Portland,
and was a friend of Pennant with whom Gilbert White of Selborne
corresponded. Lightfoot's herbarium, bought for Queen Charlotte, was
later dispersed. Part is in the British Museum (Natural History) in Sir
Joseph Banks collection and part was reputed to be at Saffron Walden
Museum. In the Banks collection are three specimens of the squill col-
lected by Lightfoot at "Muckford", Essex. There is no such place-name
in Essex but as the squill was re-discovered in Essex fairly near a hamlet
called Muckingford it seems probable that it is the same locality as that
in which the plant was found about two hundred years ago. There were
some hundreds of the blooms spread over a small area when I had the
pleasure of seeing the plant in company with some other members of
the Club.
On the Club's grass and sedge foray to South Weald Park Mr. E.
Saunders detected Scirpus setaceus L. (Isolepsis setacea (L.) R. Br.), the
bristle club-rush. Because of the wetness of the season the plants were
very tall. On the following day Dr. K. L. Alvin found the same species
in Thorndon Park and a little later found it again on Tiptree Heath.
Subsequently it has also been found near Aveley. I cannot find that this
species has been noted before on any of the Club's excursions. There
is one record dated 1911 from Epping Forest and Mr. Firmin of the
Colchester Natural History Society tells me he found it during 1957 in
the Colchester district.
There are two British species of the genus Cyperus, the galingale and
the black Cyperus. Both are described in our floras as rare and they
occur chiefly in the S.W. of the country or in the Channel Isles. I was
very pleased when Mr. Saunders brought me a fine specimen of the
galingale Cyperus longus L., from a pond on Epping Long Green which
is part of Epping Forest. A little later I had the pleasure of seeing the
plants for myself. There was quite a substantial clump which seemed
well established. It is to be regarded as an escape or a throw-out from
a garden and it remains to be seen how long it will survive.
Early in July in company with Mr. and Mrs. S. T. Jermyn I had
a damp but interesting day examining some woods in the north-west
corner of the county. Amongst others, three particularly interesting
plants were found. They were the thin spiked wood sedge Carex stri-
gosa Huds., which grows in the darkest part of thick woods on the
chalky boulder clay and likes its roots in the wettest, stickiest and
muddiest part of the wood; the spiked sedge Carex spicata Huds., and
the dainty slender tare Vicia tenuissima (M.Bieb.) Schinz and Thell.
This same tare did not escape the eyes of Mr. Saunders who found it
in two places, one near High Easter and the other not far from Match-
ing. In one of the woods we visited the hybrid between the false fox
sedge, Carex otrubae Podp. and the remote sedge, C. remota L. was
found. This hybrid C. pseudoaxillaris K. Richt. has also been found
recently at High Wood near Dunmow and at Black Notley.
It is pleasing to report that the meadow thistle Cirsium dissectum
(L). Hill has come to light again in Epping Forest. The only localities