216 SUMMARY OF CURRENT RESEARCHES RELATING TO 



F. Gneguen * wi-ites to warn the public against poisonous fungi. He 

 reiterates that there are only a few poisonous forms which any one might 

 learn to recognize easily. He has prepared a pictorial and descriptive wall- 

 sheet representing Amanita ■phaMoides, A. citrina, and Volvaria speciosa, 

 with descriptive notes. He has further printed a small pocket folding 

 map of species that are dangerous as well as those that are fatal. ^ There 

 are drawings of these fungi, with notes, and at the end instructions how 

 to treat cases of poisoning. 



Fungus parasitic on Cochineal Insect.f — J. Ruby and L. Raybaud 

 noticed that at certain times there was a great destruction of Lecanmm 

 oleae, an insect that lives on the leaves and branches of the oUve. On 

 examining the insects they found their bodies full of the yeast-form of a 

 fungus. Cultures were made of these cells, and the fungus proved to be 

 a stage in the development of Apiosporium olese. This fungus lives on the 

 sugary excretions of the insect, and the authors did not decide whether 

 the mortality noted was caused by the fungus or not. 



Notes of Fungi isolated from the Chrysalids of Cochylis.J— Ci. 

 Fron has determined several hyphomycetes from dead insects. Botrytis 

 Bassiana (Spicaria Bassiana) was found on a vine close beside two dead 

 insects, they also being covered with the fructifications of the fungus. 

 Other insects were infected and killed by the fungus. Spicaria vertidl- 

 lioides sp. n., taken from chrysalids, was also experimented with ; the 

 insects infected were mostly killed by the fungus. Another mould found 

 on a dead insect, also on vines, resembles Citromyces ylaber, but probably 

 it was a saprophyte, as it was not possible to infect the living insect with 

 the spores. The second of these three species is the most wide-spread 

 and the most virulent, and might be cultivated with great practical 

 benefit to vine growers. 



Fungus parasitic on Rotatoria. §—H. Sommerstoff has described 

 a fungus, Zoophagus insidia/is g. et sp. n., which he found in standing- 

 water between strands of Gladophora, sometimes free-growing, sometimes 

 epiphytic on the alga. The fungus belongs to the Phycomycetes, but 

 only the vegetative 'mycelium was seen. Many of the hyph« float in 

 the water free, others are attached by the ends to dead Rotatoria, and 

 the author has described the way in which the fungus attacks these 

 small animals, enters the body, forms haustoria, and very soon kills them. 

 Sommerstoff thinks that probably the creatures are caught and held fast 

 by some gelatinous substance, but whether they are attached to the hyph« 

 by chemical or mechanical means he could not determine. 



Fungus Pigments. II — Sartory and Bainier have examined a red 

 pigment formed by Aspergillus disjunctus and A. sejundus. It is in- 

 soluble in water, soluble in spirit, above all in ether, not crystallizable, 



* Bull. Soc. Mycol. France, xxvii. (1911) pp. 505-9 (1 fig.), 

 t Rev. G6n. Bot., xxiii. (1911) pp. 473-7. 

 X Bull. Soc. Mycol France, xxvii. (1911) pp. 482-8 (1 pL). 

 § Oesterr. Bot. Zeitschr., Ixi. (1911) pp. 367-73 (2 pis.). 



i| C.R. Soc. Biol. Paris, Ixx. (1911) pp. 639-41 and 776-7. See also Bot. Cen- 

 tralbl., cxix. (1912) p. 49. 



