A RAMBLE AMONG THE FOSSIL PLANTS.

Horowhenua Chronicle, 9 October 1931, Page 2

A RAMBLE AMONG THE FOSSIL PLANTS.

AN INTERESTING LECTURE. The pupils of the Secondary Department of the Levin D.H. School were recently entertained by a most instructive and interesting address by Mr H. W. Lawton, IF.L.S., agricultural officer under the Wellington Education Board. -'' . The speaker introduced his subject. by"-a reference to the age, of the eartji. He showed how the older methods of determining this had'been proved incorrect and at the present time scientists estimated the age of the earth from the disintegration of the uranium atom to lead. Mr Lawton spoke briefly of symbio•sis, or the living together of plants for mutual benefit. He showed slides of common lichens, which s are really not single plants but are moss and algae living together in symbiotic combination. He showed by slides how many trees, and particularly pines, de- . pend on fungus for much of their as'similated food and how later on the pines actually dissolved and used the fungus as food. Later on he showed glides of fossil plants, among which, "he had searched in vain for evidence of this same symbiotic union); He showed by means of excellent slides how orchids are now germinated in a culture of fungus, and are thus readily propagated. The ancestors of the kauri and lyeopodiums (that flourished on the earth sixty-six million years ago were found excellently preserved among.calcareous deposits, and by examining coal containing these deposits he had been able to dissect and examine parts of these plants. Some perfect slides of these fossil plants were shown. Mr Lawton then showed- to the pupils some of the results of his investigations for Avhich he had been granted the coveted Fellowship of the Linliean Society. After cutting sixteen hundred sections from the ovary of the N.Z. matai he succeeded in obtaining two perfect ones. By these he showed that fertilization, did not, as is usual, mean the development of one embryo but of four, and later on of four more. Then a battle for existence went on, as in the end only one emibryo could develop.* It is interesting to note that the results of Mi- Lawton's research havebeen accepted at Kew Gardens and Cambridge. Mr Lawton' kindly left, several photographs of his slides and a scintilloscope, by means of which the first process in the disintegration: of the uranium atom —the giving off of alpha particles to form helium — may be viewed.