NEW OR RARE SPECIES OF MYCETOZOA 91 



Didtmium difeorme var. kepandum, n. var. Plasmodiocarps 

 curved closely on themselves to form a flat plate, or widely expanded. 

 Capillitium of hyaline threads, stout and simple below, repeatedly 

 branched above. Tubular or funnel-shaped ingrowths of the sporan- 

 gium-wall connecting the roof with the lloor of the sporangium are 

 often present. Spores 14 to 15 p diam. 



This robust form has been obtained from Bedfordshire, Hertford- 

 shire, Sussex, and South Devon, and seems worthy of varietal dis- 

 tinction. 



Lamproderma GrULiELMJE Meylan, in Bull. Soc. Vaud. Sc. Nat. 

 lii. 449 (1919). The characters of this species are the following : — 

 Sporangia globose on slender black stalks, 0-4 mm. diam., silvery or 

 iridescent blue spotted with dark patches corresponding to thickened 

 purplish areas of the otherwise hyaline sporangium- wall. Capil- 

 litium pale brown or colourless, repeatedly branching with acute 

 angles. Spores brownish-purple, strongly spinulose, 12 to 15 n diam. 

 Habitat on dead leaves of beech and on needles of conifers. This 

 species was first described and illustrated by Dr. Marcel Brandza (in 

 Ann. Sc. de l'Univ. de Jassy, x. fasc. 2, p. 196, pi. ii. fig. 3 : 1916) 

 from luxuriant growths found by him on dead beech leaves in the 

 mountain woods of Moldavia. He regarded it as a variety of L. 

 echinulatum Kost., and described the plasmodium as translucent 

 yellow and the spores as closely reticulated. In a further gathering 

 made in November 1919, part of which he kindly sends me, the 

 spores are strongly spinulose with no reticulation, and the sporangia 

 agree in all respects with M. Meylan's type of L. Gulielmae from the 

 Jura Mts. This species has also been found in Colorado, U.S.A., by 

 Dr. W. C. Sturgis, Aug. 1914 ; in Aberdeenshire by the Rev. W. 

 Cran, Sept. 1913 ; in Norfolk by Mr. H. J. Howard, Nov. 1918 ; 

 and near Miirren, Switzerland, by Miss A. Hibbert-Ware and myself, 

 Aug. 1912. In all these gatherings the characters are remarkabty 

 constant ; the sporangia may even be identified in the field by their 

 dark-spotted walls. 



Lamproderma atrosporum Meylan var. anglicitm G-. Lister & 

 Howard, in Journ. Bot. lvii. 25, pi. 552. This variety was found by 

 Mr. H. J. Howard on dead beech leaves in woods near Norwich in 

 April 1918, and proved to be the first British record for this species. 

 The sporangia were shortly stalked or sessile, obovoid or subglobose, 

 with a network of dark capillitium threads arising from a cylindrical 

 columella, and dark, closely reticulated spores. .Associated with 

 these were numerous sessile hemispherical sporangia, usually without 

 a trace of columella, the flaccid network of pale capillitium arising 

 from the broad base of the sporangium; the pale purplish spores 

 were faintly spinulose and measured 10 /u. We submitted the two 

 sharply contrasted forms to M. Meylan : he agreed that the stronger 

 was a variety of L. atrosporum, though less robust than the typical 

 form which is frequent on the Swiss Alps — the weak form he thought 

 might also prove to be that species ; as we had at that time no 

 proof of this, we named the more abundant weak growth L. vio- 

 laceum Kost. var. debile. Last March, however, Mr. Howard was so 

 fortunate as to find further developments in the Norfolk woods, in 



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