Abstract
THE Common Heaths (Erica tetralix and E. cinerea) offer us another very ingenious arrangement. In E. tetralix (the Cross-leaved Heath), for instance, the flower is in the form of a bell (Fig. 15), which hangs with its mouth downwards, and is almost closed by the pistil (st), which represents the clapper. The stamens are eight in number, and each terminates in two cells, which diverge slightly, and have at their lower end an oval opening. But though this opening is at the lower end of the anther cells the pollen cannot fall out, because each cell, just where the opening is situated, touches the next anther cell, and the series of anthers thus form a circle surrounding the pistil and not far from the centre of the bell. Each anther cell also sends out a long process, which thus forms a series of spokes, standing out from the circle of anthers. Under these circumstances, a bee endeavouring to suck the honey from the nectary cannot fail firstly to bring its head in contact with the viscid stigma, and thus to deposit upon it any pollen derived from a previous visit; and secondly, in thrusting its proboscis up the bell, it inevitably comes in contact with one of the anther processes, which acts like a lever and dislocates the whole chain of anther cells when a shower of pollen falls from the open anther cells on to the head of the bee.†
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Common Wild Flowers Considered in Relation to Insects* II. Nature 10, 422–426 (1874). https://doi.org/10.1038/010422a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/010422a0