LYCOPERDACEAE 113 



Geaster saccatus var. Walkeri 



Buttons subspherical with or without B small blunt point, gregarious to subcespi- 

 tose, 1-1.5 cm. thick, epigean and basally attached to an obvious floccose mycelium, 

 surface felt-like, not strigose. very dark brown (verona brown of Ridgway), splitting 

 into 6 or 7 bluntish rays which extend only about one-third to one-half the distance and 

 confine the spore sac to a deep cup, outer layer not at all separable. Fleshy layer when 

 drv varying from dark brown to much paler. Spore sac grayish brown, the mouth 

 without a peristome, fimbriated about as in G.fimbriatus. 



Spores minute, faintly rough, 2-3. 2/u. 



The plant differs from G. fimbriaius in entirely different habit (basal attachment 

 of exposed buttons and inseparable spongy surface) and from G. saccatus and its rela- 

 tives in absence of peristome and very dark color. The plants are larger than any 

 species of the saccalus group except saccatus itself. The spores are smaller than in 

 any of the saccatus group except what we have called the small-spored northern form. 

 Miss Walker writes that "All of the colors had a beautiful rosy tint to them in the fresh 

 condition." 



Nebraska. Lincoln. Fall of 1926. Miss Leva B. Walker, coll. (U. N. C. Herb. No. 4). 



Geaster velutinus Morg. 



G. Readcri Cooke and Massee 

 Cydoderma ohiensis Cke. 



Plates 31, 66,67 and 115 



Unopened plants seated on the substratum (not embedded in it) and therefore 

 attached to the mycelium only at the base, ovate and bluntly pointed at the top, up to 

 2.7 cm. broad and' long. Surface dull and finely felted-tomentose, very much like the 

 surface layer of Lycoperdon leprosum. It is flesh color, becoming creamy yellow or 

 buff color on drying. Outer peridium splitting into about 7 reflexed or expanded seg- 

 ments which are a pretty flesh color on the inner (upper) surface when fresh. As these 

 dry they split more or less into two thin, fibrous, persistent layers, a characteristic habit, 

 and usually curl backward under the basal part which remains convex or flat below. 

 Inner peridium smooth, appearing minutely felty under a lens, dark brown or sometimes 

 light gray (when collected perfectly fresh), subglobose, attached by a broad or rather 

 narrow base, almost or quite sessile; mouth small, fibrillose and later lacerated, sur- 

 rounded by a distinct, radially fibrous, broadly conical, silvery gray or light to dark 

 brown area which is about 5 to 8 mm. in diameter. Columella obvious and clavate in 

 the button; slender and more obscure in the mature plant. 



Spores (of No. 4095) spherical, 2.5-3.3// thick, most about 3yu thick, distinctly as- 

 perulate and with a halo, deep smoky purplish brown. Capillitium threads rather large, 

 up to 11m thick, often branched near the tapering tips. 



In an unopened button of average size, a microscopic section of the peridia showed 

 the following: outer peridium composed of four distinct regions, (1) a surface layer 

 about 35(MO0m thick in which the threads are large, irregular, entangled and ap- 

 proximately perpendicular to the surface of the plant; (2) a very thin layer 50-65m 

 thick in which the threads are small, regular and extend approximately parallel to the 

 surface of the plant; (3) a slightly thicker layer 130-150p thick in which the threads are 

 small, regular and much entangled; and (4) a very thick (1.5 mm.), fleshy region com- 

 posed of large parenchymatous cells. Inner peridium composed of a single very thin 



