BOTANICAL EXPLORATION IN CALIFORNIA. 7 



piuni), San Jose del Cabo, Lower California, September, 1893. K. 

 Brandegee (No. 8). 



Spots deep, dark brown, becoming reddish towards the margin, 

 and surrounded by a pallid border, ^cidia hypophyllous, erum- 

 pent, small (200/ji), soon open, margin thin, erose-dentate, erect, 

 ^cidiospores globose or angular, smooth or nearly so, 15-20^ diam. 



^'Ecidium Desmum, B. & C, on the same host, has no spots. 



NOTE ON HERBARIUM- TECHNIQUE. 



An excellent adhesive substance for firmly fastening the terete 

 stems of grasses and other plants to herbarium sheets, is the "White 

 Muslin Isinglass Plaster," manufactured by Bauer & Black of Chi- 

 cago. It is cleanly, white, and so adhesive as to be immovable with- 

 out tearing the surface of the sheet to which it is attached. The 

 mounted grnss-collection of the University of California suffered 

 much from the "springing" of the ends and bent portions of stems 

 of grasses, owing to the very small glued surface which these terete 

 parts present to the paper, until this plaster was adopted. It is 

 also used in the herbarium of the California Academy of Sciences. 



BOTANICAL EXPLORATION IN CALIFORNIA IN 1896. 



It is highly desirable, at this time more than ever perhaps, that 

 the botanical exploration of California should be advanced in the 

 most systematic manner possible, and it has seemed to the writer 

 worth the while to make a record of what has been done during the 

 past year. Had a fairly complete record of exploration been made 

 during the first two decades of California's history as an American 

 commonwealth, it would not only be of historical interest, but of 

 value to those who are now engaged on the systematic botany of 

 western America. 



It is intended to include here only notes of somewhat extended 

 expeditions or accounts of prolonged collecting in a single locality. 



In the latter part of May Prof. W. A. Setchell and Mr. W. L. 



