2 PASTORAL AND AGRICULTURAL BOTANY 



lungs of birds, calves and man causing pneumomycosis. Pigeon-fatteners 

 in Paris are men who feed thousands of young pigeons daily by filling their 

 mouths with a mixture of grain and water, which they force into the 

 mouths of the pigeons, much as the parent pigeons feed their young. 

 These men suffer from aspergillosis, which is a pulmonary disorder re- 

 sembling tuberculosis and occasionally fatal. 



Cases. The most remarkable case was the presence of the fungus in 

 the lungs of a calf, which had died of a form of pneumonia. An autopsy 

 by Dr. M. P. Ravenel in which the writer participated revealed the pres- 

 ence of lumps on the external surface of the calf's lungs. Celloidin 

 sections of these pseudo-tubercular lesions mounted as double-stained 

 microscopic preparations revealed the ramifications of the mycelium 

 through the lung tissues and the emergence of the conidiophore with its 

 mass of radiating spores extending into the cavities of the lungs from which 

 by being coughed up in the sputum the conidiospores have been distrib- 

 uted. Some few lung spaces had three large fruit-bodies of the fungus 

 present, almost completely filling the cavity. 



Bromus tectorum. The awned brome grass is a slender, erect annual 

 with narrow pubescent leaves and nodding panicles of spikelets. The 

 lemmas of each floret are rough and hairy terminating in awns at least 

 13-20 mm. long 0>^-% inch). The flowers appear from June to August 

 and in Utah and Colorado during this period it has become a serious pest. 

 Its injurious effects are due to the mechanical presence under the teeth of 

 the awned glumes where they cause inflammation and suppuration, 

 the animals which have eaten the grass frequently losing their teeth as a 

 consequence. 



Cenchrus tribuloides. The sand bur is a grass common in sandy places 

 and along railroads from Maine to Florida and in Texas, the Dakotas and 

 California. The spikelets of this annual grass are surrounded by- a spiny 

 involucre which forms a hard, rigid bur with strong, barbed spines. The 

 bur is readily detached from the plant and its spines enter the skin and 

 flesh of animals, especially the lower part of the extremities, causing 

 serious inflammation in man and the lower animals. 



Heteropogon bontortus. A grass native of New Caledonia is one 

 which bores into the skin and intestines of the lower animals causing fatal 

 inflammation and peritonitis. 



