PSATHYRELLA DISSEMINATA 



43 



the tops of some very large upturned stumps of trees in a rubbish- 

 yard in Queen's Cottage Grounds at Kew, I found a number of 

 fruit-bodies of Coprinus domesticus. Some of them were arising 

 on the bark, but others directly on the soil which was still filling 

 the hollows and clefts between the roots (Fig. 25). An ozonium was 

 found attached to the 

 bases of the stipes, but 

 it could be traced only 

 a very short distance 

 down into the soil. 

 However, I have little 

 doubt that it had 

 originated from the 

 substance of the roots, 

 had grown upwards 

 through the soil, and 

 had given rise to the 

 fruit-bodies at the 

 soil's surface. Its 

 existence had per- 

 mitted the fungus to 

 produce its fruit-bodies 

 in situations which 

 otherwise could not 

 have been occupied. 



In concluding this 

 Section, it may be 

 mentioned that an 

 ozonium from the 

 stump illustrated in Fig. 20 (p. 33) gave rise to fruit-bodies of 

 Psathyrella disseminata during three successive summers. More- 

 over, the ozonium of a single stump may produce more than one 

 crop of fruit-bodies in a single summer, for one of the stumps 

 was observed to yield two crops several weeks apart. Each 

 of these two crops developed a few days after rain had brought 

 a dry spell of weather to a close. Whether or not the same 

 piece of ozonium ever produces fruit-bodies more than once, 



Fig. 25. — Coprinus domesticus. Two fruit-bodies 

 coming up on soil covering a large inverted 

 stump of an Elm (Ulmus) in Queen's Cottage 

 Grounds, Kew Gardens. Probably they were 

 connected by an ozonium with the buried wood. 

 Photographed by Miss E. M. Wakefield and the 

 writer, 1912. Natural size. 



