1922] 



BURT — THE NORTH AMERICAN SPECIES OF CLAVARIA 13 



walls slightly granular, 11-14x4-5 p. 



Cotton and Wakefield add further: "It is found in both conif- 

 erous and frondose woods (especially beech) where it occurs 

 either isolated or in groups as a pale fragile plant with a marked 

 tendency to become reddish at the base or when bruised. The 

 color is pale ochraceous, paler and yellower than in C. formosa, 

 which has a tendency to become dull pink. 



"The correct identity of the three species, C. jlava Pers., C. 

 formosa Pers., and C. aurea Fr. is a very perplexing problem and 

 one which owing to the scarcity of authentic material and the 

 meagerness of the original descriptions it is perhaps impossible to 

 solve. There can be little doubt that the plant here referred to 

 as C. jlava is the same as that described by Persoon under the 

 same name, and in this view we have the support of Maire (loc. 

 cit.). In this country it has been usually referred to as C. aurea, 

 an error which arose largely as a result of Fries' statement that 

 C. aurea differed from C. jlava in its ochraceous spores. This 

 was incorrect, as in all the species of this section the spores are 

 colored, though in seme species more so than in others." 



C. jlava has been reported from all parts of the United States 

 by mycologists who have followed Fries' statement as to color of 

 spores for distinguishing between this species and C. aurea and 

 have left no record of color changes where the specimens were 

 bruised. 



8. C. aurea Schaeffer, Icones Fung. pi. 285, 287. 1763; Fries, 

 Epicr. 574. 1838; Hym. Eur. 670. 1874; Sacc. Syll. Fung. 6: 699. 

 1888; Morgan, Cincinnati Soc. Nat. Hist. Jour. 11: 88. 1888; 

 Cotton & Wakefield, Brit. Myc. Soc. Trans. 6 : 170. 1919. 



Plate 3, fig. 12. 



Trunk thick, elastic, pale, divided into stout, tense and 

 straight, very dichotomously branched, round, obtuse, somewhat 

 toothed, yellow branches. 



On the ground in pine woods. 



C. aurea has been reported from various parts of the United 

 States on the basis of the foregoing too brief description. Future 

 gatherings which seem referable here by close agreement with this 

 description and with the reproduction of the original illustration 

 and which disagree with characters of the other better-known 



*- 



species here described, should be carefully studied, preserved, and 

 their characters fully described. In the several series of Euro- 



