HARDJVICRE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



97 



NOTES ON A NEW SPECIES OF CATERPILLAR-FUNGUS 



(TORRUBIA). 



By JOHN A1TKEN, F.G.S., &c. 



AVE you a short 

 space in which 

 I m a y d r a w 

 attention to a 

 species of fungus 

 belonging to the 

 genus Torrubia, 

 which does not 

 appear to have 

 been hitherto de- 

 scribed, and whose 

 habits are so re- 

 markable as to 

 warrant my re- 

 quest ? The plants 

 were collected in 

 Ceylon, by Mr. 

 Daniel Morris 

 (now director of 

 the Botanical De- 

 partment in Ja- 

 maica) during his residence in the first-named country, 

 and brought to England during the autumn of last year. 

 This fungus which is found in certain parts of the 

 coffee districts of Ceylon, takes root in the head of a 

 grub-like caterpillar, and developes an erect slender 

 stem some two or three inches in length, slightly 

 clubbed at the end which appears above the ground 

 to the extent of one to one and a half inches. The 

 tops are brownish-red in colour during their earlier 

 stages, resembling at first glance the fructification of a 

 moss, but gradually assume a darker hue as the 

 plants increase in age, becoming nearly black in their 

 mature state, when the spores are ready to be dis- 

 charged. The plant is propagated by spores, which 

 are developed in the elongated expansions at the top 

 of the stem in great numbers. When the spores are 

 ripe the capsules rupture, allowing them to escape, 

 when they are readily disseminated in all directions 

 by the action of the wind, and by other agencies. 

 The most singular circumstance however connected 

 No. 185. 



with the development of this fungus (a peculiarity 

 which seems to apply to most of the species belonging 

 to this genus of plants) relates to the strange position 

 selected by it as the habitat for its growth. Amongst 

 the many devastating pests to which the coffee plants 

 are subjected, rendering the coffee crop of recent 

 years in Ceylon one of the most precarious char- 

 acter, may be mentioned one, which for its destructive 

 effects, ranks only second to the dreaded Hemileia 

 itself; viz. the prevalence over large tracts of country, 

 of a caterpillar about^ three-quarters of an inch in 

 length, known to planters as the white grub. This 

 caterpillar burrows in the ground, and feeds upon the 

 young and tender rootlets of the coffee trees, thus 

 limiting their productiveness by cutting off the 

 supply of nourishment, and sapping the vitality of 

 the plants. 



This noxious insect is the larvse of various species 

 of Melolonthidoe to which the cockchafers belong. 

 Into the interior of these larvse the spores of the 

 Torrubia by one means or another effect an entrance, 

 and there vegetate, pushing their way invariably 

 through the head of the insect, and thus developing 

 into full grown plants, drawing their support from 

 the tissues and juices of their hosts, whose destruction 

 they eventually accomplish. In the Dolosbage 

 district the Torrubia is very commonly seen under the 

 coffee trees, and it can be taken up with the body of 

 the insect attached without difficulty, and it is worthy 

 of note that this district experiences a comparative 

 immunity from white grub, the reason for which is 

 attributed to the destruction to the insect caused by 

 the action of the Torrubia in the manner described. 

 The rarity of the grub in this district is so marked as 

 to have attracted the attention not only of planters, 

 but that of scientists also, and it has been suggested 

 as an interesting experiment worthy of adoption to 

 propagate the fungus in districts severely affected by 

 grub by distributing the surface soil from Dolosbage, 

 which no doubt contains spores and filaments of the 

 fungus, over districts where these larvae are known to 



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