HYMENOCHAETE UNICOLOR (Fig. 780). I found in Cuba 

 last spring, a Hymenochaete that I did not know from the Southern 

 United States. I concluded from Berkeley's accounts of Cuban 



species, that it must 

 be Hymenochaete uni- 

 color, and Miss Wake- 

 field has since com- 

 pared and confirmed 

 it. It is rarely that 

 one can determine a 

 species from the de- 

 Fig. 780. scriptions, and this was 

 not so determined. It 



was only by a process of elimination of species that it could not be, 

 that we decided finally what it must be. 



Hymenochaete unicolor is the same color (cinnamon brown of 

 Ridgway) as H. cinnamomea of Europe. The setae are rather dense, 

 projecting 40 to 60 mic. Spores are 4x6, hyaline, smooth. The 

 plant is hard and closely adnate to the host. It was common in Cuba, 

 always grows on a decorticated pole and I have seen them twenty 

 feet long, completely covered with it. What impressed me most was 



the peculiar way in 

 which the wood was 

 affected. The fungus 

 carries a most peculiar 

 rot (fig. 781.) elong- 

 ated, white spots, that 

 to the eye contrast 

 Fte- 78i- strongly with the 



brown wood. A similar rot called Rebhuhnholz in Germany or "par- 

 tridge wood" as translated, is caused in the oak by Stereum frustu- 

 losum. Hartig gave a full account of it, but it is a sad commentary 

 on the taxonomic knowledge in Germany that Hartig did not know 

 the name for the common Stereum frustulosum and called it a "new 

 species," Thelephora perdix. No wonder that the English translator 

 "did not know it as a British species". 



Hymenochaete cinnamomea is found generally on oak and is the 

 temperate region analogue of Hymenochaete unicolor in tropical 

 America. It has same color and setae, but is a thick plant, with 

 longer spores 3 x 6-9, and does not seem to attack the wood in the 

 same way. 



Hymenochaete spreta is same as Hymenochaete cinnamomea as 

 to color, but has the surface cracked into small areas. It is held by 

 Burt to be a condition of or synonym for Hymenochaete cinnamomea. 

 I am not so sure of that. Cooke referred it as a synonym for Hy- 

 menochaete unicolor, but I believe he was wrong on that, for it is a 

 much thicker species, with several annual layers in some specimens, 

 and does not affect the wood the same way. 



572 



