New York Agricultural Experiment Station. 155 



body, steel blue in color and having a diameter slightly less 

 than that of the hypha. On account of the presence of these 

 bodies it was not easy to determine whether there were septa 

 ai the points of constriction, but it was finally decided that the 

 hyphse were non-septate. No sign of fructification was present. 



After a vain endeavor to determine the fungus it was sub- 

 mitted to Prof. Geo. F. Atkinson, who at once identified it as 

 Leptomitiis lacteus Ag. With the name of the fungus known, its 

 literature became accessible and it was learned that the fungus 

 is one which lives in water contaminated with organic mat- 

 ter. In the present case it was feeding upon the small quantity 

 of cider drained from the floor of the vinegar cellar. Hum- 

 phrey^ reports its occurrence at Bridgeport, Conn., in a stream 

 below a tripe house; and Goeppert^ observed it growing in a 

 small stream below a beet-molasses manufactory near Schweid- 

 nitz, in Silesia. Humphrey^ states that in his studies " it ap- 

 peared in fly cultures from waters from the outlets of drains 

 containing decaying vegetable matter;" but so far as we can 

 learn it has not been previously reported troublesome in drains 

 except, perhaps, in a single instance. In the Country Gentleman 

 (Vol. 61, p. 406) for May 21, 1896, there is a short article headed, 

 "Fungus in Drain." In this article C. W. B[eak] of South 

 Onondaga, N. Y., gives an account of the clogging of his barn- 

 yard drain by " a thick scum — looks like the ' mother ' in vine- 

 gar." By correspondence with Mr. Beak we have obtained ad- 

 ditional details of the case and it appears probable that the 

 cause of the trouble was Lcptomitus lacteus. 



The spherical bodies at the points of constriction in the 

 hyphre are so constant and so characteristic that they should 

 serve as a mark of identification.^ (Plate VI, Fig. 1). They 



"Humphrey, J. E. The Saprolegniaceai of the United States, with 

 Notes on Other Species. Trans. Am. Phil. Soc, 17(III):13G. 



"Goeppert, H. E. Ueber Leptomitus lacteus in der Weistritz. Bcr. d. 

 l^chlrs. GeseUsch. f. vaterl. Cultur, 1852, p. 54. (Reference taken from 

 Humphrey.) 



*Loc. cit., p. 135. 



"lu all of the material examined by us the cellulin grains (cellulin- 

 korner) were found almost invariably at the points of constriction. 



