WOODS AND THEIR DESTRUCTIVE FUNGI. 439 



of lumber and timber in long voyages are often badly injured by the 

 growing mycelia between the pieces. 



In bridges, ends of posts and struts, tenons and mortises, there are 

 often similar growths of mycelia arising from the germination of 

 spores by moisture, and decay eventually takes place. The illustra- 

 tion presented in Fig. 5 is one quite familiar to all who handle lumber 

 and timber, but its import is not as generally understood as it should 

 be, from the fact that such growths are thought to be due to the decay 

 of the wood, instead of being the inducing cause. 



A little more care in piling and stacking green lumber by pro- 

 ducers and consumers, permitting circulation of air between each piece, 

 would prevent the growth of various mycelia, and save annually large 

 quantities of lumber. 



If moisture collects and remains on seasoned timber, the mycelia 

 will also grow and destroy it. Large timber should be seasoned under 

 sheds, otherwise the sun will season an outside layer, preventing the 

 escape of moisture, and internal growths of ferments and mycelia- 

 fungi will destroy the inside of the timber, a thin outer shell remaining 

 sound for some time. 



The illustration is one of the most important that can be pre- 

 sented. It shows the destruction induced by the growing mycelium 

 on the wood. On the right and lower edges, where the growth first 

 appeared, it has caused the wood to crack not only with the fibers, but 

 across, and in a short time longer it would have fallen to pieces, as 

 portions of adjacent planks had some time previously. 



The form of fructification of the fungus of mycelium shown in 

 Fig. 5, as found, was resupinate, attached to the under side of the 

 plank as that shown in Fig. 6, which is 

 a species of Polyporous very destructive 

 to hemlock in inclosed warm and damp 

 places. 



Resupinate forms of the Polyporei 

 are very common on the under side of 

 boards and timbers they are destroying, 

 covering irregular areas ; some will be 

 ten by four inches, others follow along 

 the edge of a board adjacent to a wall, 

 ten to twenty inches, having an irregular width of one to two inches, 

 the pores always pointing downward. A definite contour not being 

 followed, identification of the species is often very difficult. 



Fig. 7 shows the under and upper sides of the fruit of the fungus 

 Zentinus lepideus (Fr.) "Scaly Lentinus " an agaric, and in this 

 immediate territory is the one so destructive to timber of yellow or 

 Georgia pine (Pinus palustris, Mill) in bridges, docks, and railroad- 

 ties. 



I have also found it upon the timber of Pinus mitis. Being the first 



