TWO "ZEALANDS."

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 122, 25 May 1928, Page 9

TWO "ZEALANDS."

PLANT LIFE IN DENMARK.

EXCHANGE OF SPECIMENS.

YM.C.A. BOYS INTERESTED.

A group of boys in Auckland which has heard a good deal about the need for better relationships between the nations of the world has found an interesting way of putting the theory into practice. Under the guidance of Mr. George Adair, boys' work director of the Y.M.C.A., i hey are exchanging specimens of plant life with a group of boys in Copenhagen. The specimens sent from New Zealand so far have related mostly to native trees and ferns, and by the boys in Denmark they are greatly appreciated.

"If you will take the trouble to collect more - plants for us will you please to send us some plants with blossoms, and perhaps some grasses and half-grasses," writes the Danish leader. "You have done a wonderful work in collecting from your trees and ferns. We admire the specimens gfeatly." In return, the group in Copenhagen has forwarded to Auckland a collection of 50 specimens collected during the summer by five members of the Y.M.C.A.. Naturalist Club. They are mounted as by the hands of experts, and carefully catalogued, with particulars of botanical names, Danish names, places of discovery, nature of tht ground, and whether common or rare.

" Our collection," the letter adds, "is not so exciting to our eyes, but perhaps you will find them as interesting as we have found yours. Our plants are all collected in the environment of our capitnl, Copenhagen, which is situated on an inland called Sjelland, the Danish name for Zealand. You will see the relationship We will do more work for you this coming spring and summer." Some of the specimens from Denmark arc familiar in New Zealand- The oxalis ncetosella, which the .Danish boys gathered at Spiderskov, and call Aim. skovsque. is our wood sorrel.

The Trifolium ajvense, our haresfoot clover,* tliey call Hareklover, which does not sound very foreign.

One white clover, Trifolium repens, is tlieir woicl klover. 'fbere ' s a good deal of esperanto linking our two languages.

The Trifolurn striatum, our knotted clover, is, in Danish, Stribet klover.

Centurea cvauiis is common in their cornfields as in ours. We call it the cornflower, tjje Danes kornblowst.

The Bctirla, which is not a beet lut a bird, is, on their list, vortebirk.

Mr. Adair proposes to present the collection to one of the public institutions where they may be accessible to those interested in botanical research. The specimens arc a novel bond of interest between the two "Zealands."