Periodical Literature. yy 



An interesting compilation of the existing 

 Symbiosis knowledge regarding the cultivation of 



of fungi by ants as well as of certain wood- 



Ambrosia infesting bark beetles and other woodborers 



Beetles is furnished by Dr. Knauer. Wood being 



and poor food, the need of introducing other 



Fungi. food materials is given, so-called ambrosia 



(first discovered in 1836 by Schmidberger) 

 is an excretion of fungus mycelia which covers the bore holes. 

 The idea of real cultivation is refuted and Hubbard's theory that 

 the excreta of the beetles serves as fertilizer refuted. The ob- 

 served practical fact that Xyloterus lineatus attacks wood felled 

 in summer and immediately barked less than winter felled wood 

 of conifers is explained because of the better substratum of the 

 fungus in the pith ray cells filled with reserve material in the 

 winter wood. 



According to Neger there is no need of the teleological expla- 

 nation by conscious culture on the part of the beetle. The fruit- 

 body of the ambrosia fungus are either perithecia of the genus 

 Cerastomella, or pycnidia of the genus Graphium from which the 

 spores emanate as slimy drops. As the beetle leaves his nest it 

 must pass the entrance hole of the mother beetles and cannot help 

 brushing off the spores on his body carrying them to his new 

 abode. The long-throated pycnidia and perithecia and the fact 

 that the pores do not dust but are contained in a sticky mass 

 would appear as phenomena of adaptation for the symbiosis 

 of beetle and fungus. 



Die Symbiose der Ambrosiakdfer mit Pilzen. Centralblatt f. d. g. Forst- 

 wesen, 1908, pp. 498-501. 



Mr. E. R. Hodson has recently called at- 

 Resin Vesicles tention to the occurrence of resin vesicles, 

 in or "blisters," so typical of the genus Abies, 



Bnglemann Spruce, in the bark of the Englemann Spruce (Picea 

 engelmanni, Engelm.). His observation 

 was first made near Bernice, Montana, in 1907, and later it was 

 confirmed by other instances in Colorado. The vesicles are de- 

 scribed as not so abundant or conspicuous as balsam blisters and 

 lying deeper in the bark than in Abies. The only genus besides 

 Abies hitherto described as having resin vesicles is Pseudotsuga. 



A New Characteristic of Bngelmann Spruce. Botanical Gazette, Novem- 

 ber, 1008, p. 386. 



