14 JUNE 1935, Page 16

Botanical Slums

In a great many places cottagers have been forced to throw out their slops anywhere, and the results have often been unhappy though sometimes botanically interesting. The ground at one particular spot was once covered with the finer fescues, with evens, tormentil, thyme and ling as its weeds.

Continual slops killed all these but have provided some coarse grasses and above all one of the kexes that enjoy them. They flourish with quite exceptional vigour. Very much the same phenomenon is to be seen at the Rothamsted experi- mental station, where one of the plots treated year after year for experimental purposes with the same acid manure now produces little besides umbelliferous plants, I think chervil. Other slop areas breed chiefly nettles.