Democratic Sentinel, Volume 20, Number 31, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 7 August 1896 — A Poisonous Orchid. [ARTICLE]

A Poisonous Orchid.

Few departments of botany are more Interesting than that in which are considered the various ways in which nature provides for the protection of certain plants, A singular defensive quality has been discovered in a company tively common orchid, one of the oldest of cultivated species. This plant has decided poisonous_ properties. The poison is localized in the stem* and leaves, and those who ate Imprudent enough to handle the orchid instantly find themselves attacked by a special cutaneous Irritation, which resembles id some measure that which appears in persons who have handled poison ivy. The offensive substance consists of an oily matter secreted by the glanular hairs. This matter is found, as In the Chinese primrose, deposited betvfeeh the cellular wall and the cuticle of'th'6 terminal cellule of the hair. It is Set free by the rupture of the cuticle. This poisonous secretion seems to perform the function of protecting the reproductive portion of the Riant, for the, of .the poison and ‘the ty secreted increase as the pltfttt develops, and attain a maxim vrm during the formation of the seeds.