COPRINUS CURTUS 



the manner already described for dung-balls which have never 

 been frozen. 



The occurrence of Coprinus curtus fruit-bodies in cultures made 

 in the manner just 

 described may be ex- 

 plained as follows. 

 Fruit-bodies of this 

 fungus develop on 

 horse dung lying 

 on the prairie or in 

 fields where horses 

 graze. The spores 

 are carried away by 

 the wind and settle 

 on grasses and other 

 herbs to which they 

 become so firmly 

 attached that they 

 are not dislodged 

 either by wind or 

 rain.i Hence, when 

 hay is made , millions 

 of the spores are ad- 

 herent to the dry 

 herbage. When a 

 horse eats hay in 

 a Winnipeg stable 

 during the winter 

 months, it swallows 

 the spores with its 

 fodder ; and the 



< 



Vp. 



Fig. 2. — Coprinus curtus. Some fruit-bodies which came 

 up spontaneously on dung-balls procured from 

 England. About the maximum size for wild fruit- 

 bodies (c/. fruit-bodies in Fig. 1). The two on the 

 right shedding spores. The pilei are radially rimose, 

 owing to the splitting of the gills down their median 

 planes. In the expanded pilei the small discs are 

 depressed. The pilear scales, which could be seen 

 with a lens in the original photograph as very small 

 colourless particles, are here practically invisible. 

 Natural size. 



spores, which have 



retained their vitality in the dried condition, pass without injury 

 down the ahmentary canal of the animal concerned and, after 

 completing the journey in from two to three days, come to be 

 contained in the solid faeces dropped to the ground. When 

 1 Cf. these Researches, vol. ill, 1924, pp. 229-230. 



