Minnesota Plant Life. 



87 



a little black Indian club an inch or more in height and a quar- 

 ter to half an inch thick through the thickest part. 



The life of a fungus. There have now been passed in re- 

 view a sufficient number of fungi to give a fair idea of the group 

 as a whole. But the great variety of different species, and the 

 almost innumerable peculiarities of structure, form and function 

 which are possible, can scarcely be comprehended by any but a 

 careful student of the group. 

 Some general observations 

 concerning their lives de- 

 serve to be made. 



Regarding their nutrition 

 this may be said — that they 

 are animal-like. Not one of 

 them has the power of mak- 

 ing starch out of gas and 

 water, as green plants have, 

 and all of them must obtain 

 organic substances from 

 which to construct their 

 bodies. In a great majority 

 the vegetative area is incon- 

 spicuous because it is con- 

 cealed in the sub-stratum 

 upon wdiich the fungus lives. 

 The sub-stratum may be the 

 soil, a rotting log, a living 

 twig or leaf, a piece of pa- 

 per, the hair or feathers of 

 an animal or bird, a bit of 

 dung, or, for aquatic fungi, 

 various similar objects submerged in lakes, streams, pools or 

 springs. Concerning the reproduction of the fungi, it may be 

 noted that the higher forms commonly develop at least two 

 kinds of spores, one being entirely disconnected with the breed- 

 ing-habits of the plant, the other dependent upon the breeding 

 act — a process which often takes place upon areas concealed in 

 the sub-stratum. The rudiments of all true fruit-bodies, such 

 as those of the cup-fungus, the morel, the ergot, the cater- 



FiG. 33. Fungus spot-disease of bean pods. 

 After Halsted. 



