176 NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



small species, not liable to be mistaken for any other except possibly for 

 very small, pale forms of the spreading hydnum. But wholly white 

 examples of this species have never been seen by me. 



The caps are 1 to 2 inches broad, and the stems are generally about 1 

 inch long and 3 to 5 lines thick. 



The plants grow in thin woods or in open bushy places and appear in 

 June and July. It is not a common species and, though well flavored, it is 

 not of very great importance as an edible mushroom because of its scarcity 

 and small size. 



Hydnum caput-ursi Fr. 

 Bear's head Hydnum 



PLATE 67, fig. 8-12 



Fleshy, tuberculiform, immarginate, pendulous, lateral or erect, white, 

 the surface everywhere emitting short branches, which are clothed with 

 branchlets and subulate, deflexed aculei ; spores globose or subglobose, .0002 

 to .00024 of an inch broad. 



The bear's head hydnum is intermediate between the coral-like hydnum, 

 H. coralloides, on one hand, and the hedgehog hydnum, H. erinaceus, 

 and the medusa's head hydnum, H. cap u t-m eclu sae, on the other. By 

 reason of the numerous short branches of its surface it is classed with the 

 branching species of the tribe Merisma, but on account of its thick, fleshy, 

 tuberculiform body it shows a close connection with the unbranched tuber- 

 culiform species. The American fungus is not always pendulous, and in 

 this respect it differs from the typical form described by Prof. Fries. 



When it grows from the upper side of a prostrate trunk, it is erect or nearly 

 so. When it grows from the side of a standing or of a prostrate trunk, it 

 may be either ascending or pendulous, or it may develop in both directions. 

 The solid body is sometimes elongated and narrow, sometimes short and 

 thick. Its branches are often scarcely more than tuberculiform projections 

 or processes, and the general outline of the whole fungus sometimes bears a 

 striking resemblance in size and shape to the heart of an ox. The spine- 

 like teeth vary much in length. They are generally from 4 to 12 lines long, 

 and point downward. They are longer than in the coral-like hydnum and 

 shorter than in the hedgehog hydnum. The whole plant is white and 



