ENG-1968 — Page 361

NATURAL HISTORY

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are very beautiful and have long been cultivated in other countries. Probably the best known of the local species is the Nun orchid, bearing flowers four inches across with white petals and a purple lip. Other noteworthy species are the white Susanna orchid, the yellow Buttercup orchid, the pink Bamboo orchid and the purple Lady's Slipper orchid.

There is a fine wild iris, Iris speculatrix, further south than any other true iris. Its violet flower, from two-and-a-half to three inches in diameter, is tinged with bright orange and blooms from the middle of March to the end of April. A wild lily, Lilium brownii, appears in June with its trumpet flowers up to seven inches in length, white and sometimes purple-streaked. A wild Crinum with long sword-like leaves and bunches of white flowers is found by the sea, and also the Belamcanda, one of the iris family, with red- dotted orange-yellow flowers. The Chinese Bell-flower, Platycodon, is very widely distributed in eastern Asia, being abundant as far north as Manchuria and as far south as Hong Kong. This lovely violet giant harebell is common on grassy slopes on the south side of Hong Kong Island. It is a perennial plant with thick fleshy root stock valued for medicinal purposes and was introduced into culti- vation in England as far back as the 17th century.

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In damp ravines may be found the chirita, several begonias, a fragrant-leaved rush, stag's horn mosses, giant aroids, tree-ferns and countless kinds of smaller ferns, including maidenhair and the local Royal ferns. On hillsides, English bracken, a cosmopolitan plant, may be seen growing together with the so-called Hong Kong bracken, a Dicranopteris and a fragrant-leaved myrtle called Baeckea.

Plants recorded for the first time in recent years were Crawfurdua fasciculata, Malaxis acuminata var. biloba and Goodyera foliosa, found in the New Territories and Zeuxine gracilis, found on Hong Kong Island.

The Hong Kong Herbarium, which provided the foundation for the work of Dunn and Tutcher's Flora of Kwangtung and Hong Kong, has been added to considerably since that book was produced and at present some 30,000 specimens are preserved.

By regulations, made under the Forestry Ordinance, special protection is given to certain plants including camellias, enkianthus, magnolias, orchids, and azaleas.