A Case of Abnormal Flower Structures connected with Reduced Fertility in Solidago Virgaurea L.

In 1949 the author noticed S. virgaurea with the spreading part of the ray flowers, the so called rays, “split” into narrow lobes (Plate 27 B; a normal individual is illustrated in Plate 27 A). The observation was first made on a plant, that had settled with some normal ones into a flower box; it seems probable that the plants have been brought there as “seeds” among the soil rests from a cleaned collecting container. Having thus become acquainted with the modified plant, similar individuals could be collected in nature; (Baarn, province of Utrecht; on the slopes along a railway, September 1949, specimens in herb. pr.). An examination of the abnormal flower structures provides the distinction of two groups, as a result of the floral organization of S. virgaurea, there being two types of flowers in the head: the outer zygomorphic, female ray flowers and the inner actinomorphic, perfect disk flowers.