To Daniel Oliver [21 November 1860]1
[Down]
My dear Mr Oliver.—
Thank you for your note—2 I do not think the plant can be an Asclepias:3 as far as my memory serves the flowers were very simple & I think the proboscis was caught between stamens & pistil. The minute white or very pale pink flowers were not in trusses or umbels. I have seen the plant fairly studded with captured flies. My Father called it the Fly-catcher. It died down in winter. The leaves were narrow.— stem thin, much branched smooth & I think slightly succulent. You did send me the curious account of Asclepias, which surprises me much, considering R. Browns paper on importance of insects in its fertilisation.—4 The conferva seems a good suggestion.—
Yours very sincerely | C. Darwin
In the Fly-catcher the orifice of corolla was small.— It is odd that such a plant shd. not be in Kew.— It lived 30 years ago for very many years in my Father’s flower-garden.— Would you ask Sir William if he can recognise my vague account?5
Footnotes
Summary
The plant CD’s father called "flycatcher" was not Asclepias.
Letter details
- Letter no.
- DCP-LETT-2987
- From
- Charles Robert Darwin
- To
- Daniel Oliver
- Sent from
- Down
- Source of text
- DAR 261.10: 27 (EH)
- Physical description
- ALS 2pp
Please cite as
Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 2987,” accessed on 20 April 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-2987.xml
Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 8