LiCEOPSis 219 



1. Reticularia Lycoperdon Bull. Herb. Fr. pi. 446, fig. 4. 1789; 

 Bull. Champ. 95. 1791. 



Plasmodium cream-white (Lister). Aethalium pulvinate or 

 subglobose, 5 mm. to 8 cm. diam., brownish copper-colored, or 

 enclosed in a thin, smooth, silvery cortex, seated on a well- 

 developed hypothallus of interwoven, membranous strands. 

 Pseudo-capillitium consisting of persistent portions of the sporan- 

 gial walls, forming irregular branching strands arising from the 

 hypothallus, dividing above into numerous, slender, flattened and 

 flexuose rusty brown threads. Spores free or adhering loosely in 

 large clusters, somewhat turbinate from the clustering, rusty 

 brown, thickened and closely reticulate on the rounded or ex- 

 posed surface, the remaining part marked with scattered warts, 

 6-10 IX diam. 



Type locality: France. 



Habitat: On dead wood. 



Distribution: Throughout North America, and fairly 

 common. 



Illustration: Lister, Mycetozoa ed. 3, pi. 154, figs. a-c. 



This species usually has small plasmodia forming a single 

 aethalium. Occasionally, there may be as many as five or six 

 large aethalia from a vigorous plasmodium, as happens also in the 

 other aethalioid genera. The belief that a plasmodium yields 

 but a single aethalium is disproved by long field experience. The 

 silvery cortex is not always present, and the degenerate inner 

 sporangial walls may be more developed, at times. Such forms 

 may resemble Enteridium Rozeanum. The spores of R. Lyco- 

 perdon germinate very rapidly, requiring about 20 minutes in 

 fresh material, so the species can be distinguished from E. 

 Rozeanum with certainty by making the test, as the spores of the 

 latter require a much longer time. 



Genus 36. LICEOPSIS Torrend, Bull. Soc. Portug. Sc. Nat. 

 2:63. 1908. 



Sporangia closely compacted, sessile, rarely free or stalked, 

 subglobose, with fragile membranous walls; capillitium consist- 

 ing of slender, branching threads and strands with membranous 

 expansions at the axils, or wanting. 



A SINGLE SPECIES. 



