IOWA ACADEMY OF SCIENCE 59 



where the hymenial surface is scratched or bruised. Both forms grow 

 for successive years, becoming stratified; both are highly geotropic as 

 described by Montague, changing the direction of the fructification to 

 correspond to any accidental change of horizon. 



Nearly related to the above species is a curious dark brown Forties 

 found sometimes at the base of currant bushes, perhaps subsisting on 

 the wood of the constantly drying shoots, perhaps half-parasitic, but 

 at least confined apparently to one habitat. This species is Fomes rihis 

 (Schum.) Fr. It resembles in color and texture F. applanatus Pers., 

 but is smaller, more delicate, with sharp edge and somewhat softer con- 

 text. The species is said to be common in Europe on the base of cur- 

 rant bushes, but I have found it but once, in my own garden at Iowa 

 City. 



The remaining fungi to be at this time presented belong to the gas- 

 teromycetes; they are puff-balls. Of these the most beautiful forms are 

 the geasters, earth stars, and I beg to call attention to a single species. 



Geaster marginatus is the name applied to a delicate little form de- 

 scribed by Vittadini from northern Italy in 1842. Vittadini character- 

 ized his species by the presence of a peculiar slender groove surrounding 

 the peristome of the elongate, ovate inner peridium. Schweinitz mean- 

 time had described from the Carolinas an elegant little geaster under 

 the name of Geaster minimus Schw. Under some juniper trees in Scott 

 county a few years since, the writer discovered a colony of elegant 

 earth-stars which are evidently closely related to both the species named. 

 G. Minimus Schw. is the Italian form minus the peristomatic groove, and 

 with nearly spherical peridium : the latest discovered specimens have 

 the size and form of G. marginatus but have no groove. For this Iowa 

 type the name G. junipcrinus n. s. is proposed. Since opportunity for 

 appropriate illustration is not afforded our editor, full description with 

 figures of this species will appear presently in Mycologia. 



Lastly, in Iowa occur two species of the greater puff-balls: Calvatia 

 hovista (L.) Macbr. and Calvatia pachydermata (Pk.) Morg. The former 

 is the common giant puff-ball of the northern world. Of this species the 

 writer has encountered three colonies in a collecting experience of 

 thirty-five years. He has, however, lately succeeded in establishing the 

 mycelium upon his private grounds and crops of sporocarps are now 

 expected at possibly shorter intervals. 



C. pachydermata (Pk.), however, is a western, shall we sa}^ desert spe- 

 cies. The type was sent to Dr. Peck from Arizona. The species has 

 been reported from the dry plains of Dakota, and I have taken it twice 

 in Iowa, once in a peculiar dry, sandy phytographic region in Musca- 



