TAHITI. 



525 



Hence, the nurse stem which has thrown off several buds, is 

 transversely jointed in appearance. Some of the stems in the 



ENLARGED VIEW OF THE SCAR LEFT ON THE END OF 

 THE STOCK WHEN A TOCNG CORAL HAS BECOME 

 DETACHED. 



E Fresh discoid coral commencing to bud forth; 

 e wide surrounding scar surface. 



DIAGRAM REPRESENTING A NURSE STOCK OF 

 THE MUSHROOM CORAL. 



a b Successive joints of the stem which have 

 each thrown off a free discoid coral ; 

 d young mushroom coral still attached to 

 the last joint of the stock ; c a transverse 

 line marking where the present bud will 

 separate. 



specimen I found, showed thus three rings. Stutchbury ima- 

 gined that each mother stock threw off only one bud, and then 

 died ; Semper showed that this was not the case, he speaks of 

 three or four generations only being produced by each stock. 

 Apparently the number produced is very limited. None of the 

 stocks in my specimens were branched. A young Coral bud 

 just ripe, 1-^th of an inch in diameter, dropped off one of the 

 stocks as I lifted the specimen from the water. Beneath it on 

 the scar, another very small young Fungia had begun to bud out 

 before its predecessor was quite free. The somewhat cup- 

 shaped buds, when set free, become by the direction in which 

 future growth takes place, flat and disc-shaped and develope 

 eggs, from which spring free-swimming larvae, which start fresh 

 stocks. 



The mass of nurse stocks which I found was surrounded 

 on the reef by a group of fully-formed Fungias of all sizes, I 

 counted twenty in all. Some six of these were small and still 

 showed the scar of attachment which disappears in the process 

 of subsequent growth. 



A species of Mill&pora (M. nodosa. Esper), is a very common 

 coral upon the Tahitian reefs. It forms irregular nodular masses 

 usually of small size, and often encrusts dead corals of other 



