MUSK LOSES ITS SCENT

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXIII, 6 August 1929, Page 9

MUSK LOSES ITS SCENT

Lovers of iliat old-fashioned flower the musk must have noticed that it has lost its sweet scent. At one time its fragrancq penetrated almost everywhere; now the plant is scentless, and no one seems to be able to give a satisfactory reason. Originally the Mimulus Moseliatus was brought from Vancouver Island, and it grew abundantly on the mainland around Vancouver City and in other parts of British Columbia. A writer in the "Children's Newspaper" savs that there, too, its scent has failed.

"Since, about the beginning of the war (he. Mimulus Moschatus lias also, lost its scent in this part of British Columbia. I have asked many gardeners if they can account, for the phenomenon, but have received no explanation. When our family first settled in Vancouver, some forty years ago, the forest was still in possession where to-day are paved streets. At that lime, even in the heart of the city. I he smell of musk was quite noticeable, and on summer evenings the dainty little branches with a yellow (lower or two might be seen sticking up between the planks of our wooden sidewalks. Now the scent of the musk has gone. It was never so. powerful as I lie Knglish-grown music. Our flowers, are not so strongly fragrant as (he English (lowers. We can compete in si/.e. quantity, and colour, but not in fragrance;. The children used to call the musk the smell-once flower. That was because it had the peculiar effect., of dulling the sense of smell after the first good sniff. Yon had (o breathe a few times in unscented air before you could smell the musk again. To-day I can walk for miles down the various forest trails without meeting the faintest trace of the heavy sweet odour of the musk. I do not know whether this holds good all over the lower mainland of Rritish Columbia, or for the larger varieties thai grow in the upper country, hill il is time of hundreds of square miles in the Vancouver part of the Province."