DIACII/EA 187 



2. DlACHy^A SPLENDENS Peck. 



Plate VII., Figs. 1, \ a, lb, If. 

 1877. Diachaea splendens Peck, Rep. N. Y. Mus., XXX., p. 50. 



Sporangia gregarious, metallic blue with brilliant iridescence, 

 globose, stipitate ; stipe white, short, tapering upward ; hypothallus 

 white, venulose, a network supporting the snowy stipes; columella 

 white, cylindric, passing the centre, obtuse; capillitium lax, of slender, 

 anastomosing, brown, translucent threads ; spores in mass black, by 

 transmitted light dark-violaceous, very coarsely warted, 7-10 fi. 



This is perhaps the most showy species of the list. The globose 

 brilliantly iridescent sporangia are lifted above the substratum on 

 snow-white columnar stalks; these are again joined one to another by 

 the pure white vein-like cords of the reticulate hypothallus. The 

 Plasmodium may spread very widely over all sorts of objects that 

 come in the way, dry forest leaves and sticks, or the fruit and foliage 

 of living plants. Closely resembling the preceding, but differing in 

 the globose sporangia, it may be instantly recognized under the lenses 

 by its coarsely papillate spores. 



Not common. New York, Pennsylvania, Ontario, Ohio, Iowa, 

 Nebraska. 



3. DlACH^A SUBSESSILIS Pk. 



1879. Diachaea suhsessilis Pk., Rep. N. Y. Mus. Nat. History, XXXI., p. 41. 

 1894. Diachaea suhsessilis Pk,, Lister, Mycetozoa, p. 92. 



Sporangia gregarious or closely crowded, small, about .5 mm., dull 

 iridescent-blue, greenish-gray, etc., globose or depressed-globose, short- 

 stalked or nearly sessile ; stipe generally very short, reduced sometimes 

 to a mere persistent cone, white ; columella obsolescent or reduced to 

 white conical intrusion of the stipe; capillitium radiating from the 

 stipe, brown, consisting of branching, anastomosing threads, paler at 

 the tips; hypothallus very scanty or none; spores minutely warted, 

 the papillae arranged in an irregular, loose net-work, violet-brown, 

 paler under the lens, 10-12 fx. 



This species is easily recognizable by its diminutive size and gener- 

 ally defective structure ; i. e. it has the appearance of a degenerate or 



