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A NEW MYXOMYCETE FOR [NEW SOUTH WALES. 



By D. McAlpine. 



( Comviunicated by J. H. Maiden.) 



On the 2nd of February Mr. J. H. Maiden, Director of the 

 Botanic Gardens, sent me a micro-fungus from a lawn in front of 

 his house which was common on Buffalo-grass (Stenotajjhrum 

 amencmium, Schrank) and Couch-grass (Cynodon dactylon, L. C. 

 Rich.); also on Ityllingia moiwcephala, Rottb., a cyperaceous 

 plant. It has since been found on a lawn in the Garden Palace 

 Grounds, but has not been observed in any other localities up to 

 the present. It belongs to the group of Slime-fungi or Myxomy- 

 cetes and is a novelty for New South Wales, although already 

 recorded for West Australia and Victoria. It is Physarum 

 ci)iereiim, Pers., and is commonly found on dead leaves, bark, wood, 

 «fec. The grass sent was pretty well covered with very minute 

 roundish or hemispherical cinereous sporangia, which were crowded 

 together, and the wall readily showed the presence of lime on the 

 application of an acid. Many of them were burst and the spores 

 were of a pale violet colour, spherical, smooth, and averaging 

 10-11 /x in diameter. 



As the spores varied somewhat in colour from the description 

 given in Lister's recent "Monograph of the Mycetozoa," I sent 

 specimens to that gentleman, and he has just kindly replied as 

 follows: — "With regard to the colour of the spores of /'.c//2ere?«», 

 I admit that ' bright violet-brown ' is strong, but it is not pure 

 violet, I think, and at the time I published the Monograph (1894) 

 I had not separated P. vernum, which has, as a rule, browner 

 spores. Pale violet-grey might better express the typical colour of 

 P. cinereum spores, but it is dilhcult to express colour in words. 

 I have given 'violet-brown' for the colour of P. nutans; there is 



