To Daniel Oliver   1 June [1867]¹

The year is established by the relationship between this letter and the letter from H. G. H. Norman, 30 November 1866 (Correspondence vol. 14).

Herbert George Henry Norman, the nephew of CD’s neighbour George Warde Norman, sent CD a woodcock’s leg with earth attached to it in November 1866 (see Correspondence vol. 14, letter from H. G. H. Norman, 30 November 1866, and letter to H. G. H. Norman, [after 30 November 1866]). There is a note in CD’s Experimental notebook, DAR 157a, p. 83, that reads: Dec. 2^d. 1866   M^r Herbert Norman of Oakley near Bromley sent me leg of Woodcock with tarsus coated with mud, which when dry weighed 8–9 grains. Planted on burnt sand, Dec^r 3^d. Dec. 8^th a monocot: plant, apparently a rush, has [after del ‘or Luzula’] has germinated!!! The plant turns out Juncus bufonius or toad rush— — grows “commonly in marshy ground, especially on watery sandy Heaths.” Sir J. E. Smith.— In his English flora (J. E. Smith 1824–36, 2: 168), James Edward Smith had written of Juncus bufonius: ‘In marshy ground, especially on watery sandy heaths, common.’ Since no record of any other plants having germinated from the mud attached to the woodcock’s leg has been found, the J. bufonius was probably the plant CD asked Oliver to identify. Oliver’s reply has not been found in the Darwin Archive–CUL. CD mentioned the woodcock’s foot and the Juncus bufonius in Origin 5th ed., p. 440. CD had earlier grown plants from seeds found in a ball of earth attached to a partridge’s foot; see Correspondence vols. 11 and 12, and Origin 4th ed., p. 432. He was interested in such cases as examples of possible seed distribution by birds.