THE PLANT WOKLD 149 



cucullate, with two crimson spots at the base, the margin fringed; 

 racemes produced from the nodes of the leafless stems, drooping, four 

 to seven inches long, many flowered; the rachis is zigzag; the ovate- 

 ] { 1 ( ( ate leaves five inches long; the stems from two to three feet long. 

 These orchids are native in Khasya and Sikkim. 

 New York City. 



THE DWARF MISTLETOE, RAZOUMOFSKYA PUSILLA. 



By John Giffoed. 



THE Loranthaceae or Mistletoe Family is represented in the north- 

 eastern United States by only two species of mistletoe. One, 

 Razoumofshya pusilla, is small, of local occurrence, and parasitic 

 on the blaok spruce. The other, Plioradendron fiavescens, is larger in 

 size, and so abundant southward that it is collected and sold as an 

 evergreen at Christmas time. It occurs on the black gum, red maple, 

 and now and then on other trees. It is, however, not a serious pest, 

 because it infests trees of little commercial value, and because it is kept 

 in check, in fact in places has been almost exterminated by collectors of 

 Christmas greens. 



Razoimiofskya pusilla, although it occurs only here and there, is a 

 serious pest where it does occur. The affected spruces are usually 

 yellow in appearance, and finally die of the depletion caused by the 

 myriads of fleshy guests which cover the tender twigs. 



C. F. Wheeler reports (in the First Eeport of the Upper Peninsula 

 Experiment Station of Michigan) that it is common and very destruc- 

 tive to black spruces in upper Michigan. He states that the parasite is 

 widely distributed in northern Michigan, and that in some swamps 

 every spruce has been killed. He found also that this mistletoe was 

 infested by a fungus parasite Wallrothiella arceuthobii Peck. Razoii- 

 niofrky a pusilla causes what are commonly called witches'-brooms on 

 the limbs of the spruces. This term witches'-broom, or Hexenbesen in 

 German, is a generic word for malformations of a broom-like nature. 



On the 25th of April, 1901, Mr. William Howard, a student 

 of the New York State College of Forestry, found this mistletoe 

 in considerable quantity on the spruces around Panther Pond in the 

 College tract in the Adirondacks. Although there was still some snow 

 on the ground, the parasite was in full bloom. In Britton k Brown's 

 Flora June is stated as the blooming time. It was in full bloom here 

 in the mountains on the 25th of April. There were evidences that quite 

 a number of spruces had been killed by it. 



