108 THE VICTORIAN NATURALIST. 



with a testimonial of the value of ;CT^°- I" ^885 he visited 

 Australia as a popular lecturer, when he was present at one of the 

 monthly meetings, and was afterwards elected an hon. member of 

 the Field Naturalists' Club of Victoria. On his return to England 

 he resumed his scientific and journalistic work, which he kept up 

 almost until his death. 



Ants as Fungus Growers. — In that extremely interesting 

 work, " A Naturalist in Nicaragua," Bell has given us much 

 insight into the habits and manner of working of the " leaf- 

 cutting" ants of the tropics. The German botanist, Alfred 

 MoUer, has lately given some attention to the habits of a 

 Brazilian species, Atta discigera, which like its Nicaraguan 

 congener stores up the so-called " ant food." This is usually a 

 soft, brown, spongy mass, grown over and over with the 

 mycelium of a fungus, and Belt hazarded the opinion that the 

 ants used the leaves as vegetable matter on which to grow the 

 fungus, and were in fact "growers and consumers of mushrooms." 

 The mycelium was found to be covered with groups of little 

 white dots, which under close examination proved to be the club- 

 shaped ends of filaments, and it was on these the ants fed, 

 besides which, by their constant attention, they were able to 

 prevent any further development of the fungus. Moller has now, 

 by a series of experiments, proved that Belt was correct in his 

 surmise, and has been fortunate in obtaining a fully developed 

 specimen of the fungus produced by the mycelium, and from the 

 spores of which he successfully grew the mycelium with its club- 

 shaped filaments, upon which the ants readily fed. The new 

 species has been named Jiosites gongi/lop/wra. 



Ants and Orchids. — According to J. H. Hart, the presence 

 of ants seems to be essential to the well-being of certain orchids. 

 Whether the effects produced are directly due to ants, or to some 

 indirect cause, has not yet been determined. The author is 

 inclined to think that the ants confer benefit on the plant by 

 providing it with the mycelium of a fungus to cover its roots, 

 this organism enabling it to take up food which would otherwise 

 be unavailable. It may be that the presence of stinging ants 

 protects the plant, but. Mr. Hart thinks it is almost certain that 

 the fungus, which grows in the material that the ants accumulate 

 around the root, plays an important part in the nutrition of the 

 plant by providmg it with food material. — Nalare, lii., 627. 



A bronze bust of Robert Brown, the botanist, the earliest 

 student of Victorian plants, has been placed in a niche of the 

 house at Montrose, Scotland, where he was born in 1773. — 

 Natural jScience, November, 1895. 



