REPORT OF THE KANSAS ACADEMY OF SCIENCE. 



At the last session of the Legislature, the Kansas Acailemy of Science was 

 incorporated as a State organization by the following act : 



" The Academy of Science shall be a co-ordinate department of the State Board of 

 Agricultnre, with their office in the agricultural room, where they shall place and keep 

 for public inspection the geological, botanical and other specimens, the same to be under 

 the direction and control of the officers of the said Academy of Science. An annual 

 report of the transactions of said Academy of Science shall be made on or before the 

 fifteenth day of November, of each year, to the State Board of Agriculture, for publication 

 in the Annual Transactions of said Board. This section to be inoperative and void unless 

 accepted by the said Academy of Science, in writing, signed by the president and attested 

 by the secretary thereof." [Chapter 137, Sec. 2.] 



The people of the State have thus indicated their appreciation of the aims 

 and work of the Society, by incorporating it as a State institution. 



The year has been fruitful to the cause of science in the State, in many 

 respects. 



Professor B. F. Mudge, of the State Agricultural College, has discovered ^ 

 in Osage county, fossil footprints, of which a paper containing a full synopsis 

 is appended. This is probably the most important discovery ever made in 

 science in the State of Kansas, and will add a laurel wreath to the well- 

 earned reputation of this veteran geologist. The discovery has already 

 elicited a wide interest in scientific circles in the East, and several tons of the 

 specimens have been ordered for Eastern cabinets. 



Professor Frank H. Snow, of the State University, has continued to 

 publish his carefully prepared meteorological reports, at Lawrence, The 

 University has been provided with a full set of self- registering instruments 

 for meteorological purposes, and there is a good prospect that it will be made 

 a signal station. 



Professor J. H. Carruth has continued his observations on the plants of 

 Kansas. He writes in siibstance: 



"I have become acquainted with twenty-one species that I gave last year on the 

 authority of Prof. Snow and Hall. The year past I have studied more the hedge plants 

 and grasses. I have found the garden gooseberry to be Bibes hiriellum, native in the 

 country, but not wild in Kansas. My list of plants for the year, which I send, is to be 

 increased by the observations of Prof. Snow, who has added about eighty species. Prof. 

 John Wherrell collected all summer, and will add some; also, Mr. E. A. Papineau. 

 Prof. B. F. Mudge has sent me some specimens, and Mrs. Craig, of Quenemo, has brought 

 me a teasel not in the books. I have found two which Prof. Wood thinks are new, viz. : 

 an Asclepias, one foot high, with a single nodding umbel, and a Rosa, with lone stem 

 quite prickly ; leaflets, about nine, and flowers about ten, and fruit mostly conical." 



