A Robotic Ecology

"'I can imagine a robotic ecology, based on self-reproducing solar-cell units that'd perform the equivalent of photosynthesis,' Flandry said. 'I seem to recall it was actually experimented with once.'"
-Poul Anderson, A Circus Of Hells IN Anderson, Young Flandry (Riverdale, NY, 2010), pp. 193-365 AT Chapter Seven, pp. 240-241.

Is he referring to the events of "Epilogue," which was published in Analog in 1962, eight years before A Circus Of Hells, and was collected in Poul Anderson, Explorations (New York, 1981), pp. 177-240?

See:

Epilogue
How Robotic Evolution Began
Fighting Robots
Epilogue: Conclusion
Epilogue And Strange Bedfellows
Madness And Divinity