93 



On January 29, we were joined by Mr. Lewcock, an Aur-,- 

 tralian student who has been spending the year at the University 

 of Wisconsin. As previously arranged, Mr. Lewcock came to 

 Bermuda to make observations on a fungus parasite of the 

 prickly-pear cactus, looking toward the possibility of introducing 

 the fungus into Australia to combat the cactus which has over- 

 run more than sixty millions of acres of land there, making it 

 useless. The spread of the cactus there has been so rapid that 

 man is unable to cope with the pest and attempts are now being 

 made to fight it by natural means. 



On Monday, February i, we were invited to attend the Somer- 

 set Garden club meeting and speak. The meeting was held at 

 the home of Mr. and Mrs. F. C. Misick with an attendance of 

 about thirty-five, for the most part former Americans, now resi- 

 dents of the so-called American colony. As first speaker, I gave 

 a brief discussion of my mission to the islands, dealing with the 

 mycological phases of the subject. Professor Whetzel followed 

 with a discussion of the important plant diseases of the islands 

 and the means of control. Mr. Lewcock discussed the prickly- 

 pear difiiculty in Australia, and Mr. MacCallan added a few 

 w^ords, after which a social time was enjoyed. It rained during 

 the entire day so that no opportunity was afforded for field work. 



On Tuesday, February 9, Mr. Thos. Godet kindly offered to 

 take us in his motor boat to a number of the islands in the harbor 

 to observe the effect of the fungus blight on the prickly-pear 

 cactus. The most interesting was Grace's Island, where the cac- 

 tus had been almost wiped out by the disease. While Mr. Lew- 

 cock was making the necessary observations, I took the oppor- 

 tunity to collect fungi and was surprised to find a number not 

 before observed from the islands, among them a Geaster, a Tylo- 

 stoma, and a Poronia, the last being of especial interest. 



The remaining time was spent in drying and arranging ma- 

 terial for shipment and getting ready to sail for home. More 

 than three hundred collections were made. These will be sent 

 first to Cornell University, where they will be separated and a por- 

 tion of each collection returned to the Garden. When this col- 

 lection is finally disposed of, our knowledge of the fungi of 

 Bermuda will be more complete than that of any of the islands 

 of the American tropics or subtropics, with the possible excep- 

 tion of Porto Rico. -n ,<• ^ , -^^ , 



Respectfully submitted, 



Fred J. Seaver. 



