HYPOCREALES 



241 



its name (Fig. 156, 3). When conidial formation is exhausted, the small, 

 dark red perithecia, about 1 mm. high, with a conical ostiole arise beneath 

 the drop of slime that crowns the typical fructification. This genus 

 connects directly with the stromatic Nectriaceae ; it has in common with 

 them the development of a succession of conidia and perithecia on the 

 same stroma, and differs from them only in the more highly differentiated 

 structure of its stromata. 



Towards a third direction has developed the Mycocitrus- Shiraia 

 group, of which we discuss Mycocitrus under the Didymosporae, Pelero- 

 nectria under the Phragmosporae and Shiraia under the Dictyosporae. 

 All three are epiphytic on bamboo twigs. In Brazil, Mycocitrus auran- 

 tium forms a golden-yellow fructification, up to 12 cm. in cross section, 



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gpes 





S&BSBz 



^2S?5afc'Ti?5iri 



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M- 



Fig. 156. — Corallomyces Iatrophae. 1. Longitudinal section. 2. Conidial fructifica- 

 tion. 3. Coralloid conidial fructification. 4. Young perithecia and conidial gel. 5. 

 Hypogaeous conidial fructifications on Aipim roots. (1,2X3;3, 4 X4;5 X 1^; after 

 Holler, 1901.) 



which, as its name indicates, looks like an orange (Fig. 157). The 

 context consists of a light-colored, glassy mass which is permeated by 

 darker veins consisting of thick-walled hyphae. The perithecia are 

 formed in the rind over the whole surface of the fructification and form a 

 large number of spores; Moller (1901) reckons them at over a billion per 

 fructification. When a perithecial generation is exhausted and emptied, 

 it becomes overgrown by a stroma which forms a new perithecial layer, 

 suggesting conditions in certain perennial Basidiomycetes. 



Peloronectria vinosa, also Brazilian, forms irregular, soot-gray to 

 brown-yellow lumps which do not bear the perithecia on their rind but 

 raised above the fructification on short columnar outgrowths. The 

 conidial form, which appears in artificial cultures, corresponds to the 

 Fusarium type, as in Mycocitrus aurantium. The Japanese Shiraia 

 bambusicola, finally, corresponds to Mycocitrus of the Dictyosporae and 



