Studies of Teratological Phenomena. 



69 



Races which are suspected of being hereditary, but about which 

 little is known genetically, have been from time to time recorded as 

 variants of Cirsium (Moq.-Tand.), Reseda and Myosotis (de Vries), 

 Curcurhita pepo (Mazzani and de Vries), Oxalis crenata (Kuntze 

 and Hus), Ipomoea batatas Poir. (Conard) and Ananas sativus Schult. 

 (M. T. Cook). 



There is another class of fasciation commonly present in woody 

 and herbaceous plants, which appears to be transmitted asexually. There 

 is no experimental e\idence that they 

 are germinal variations, but the fact 

 that the anomaly reappears in every 

 season's renewal of growth, is regarded 

 by some observers as proof that it is a 

 hereditary phenomenon. In Ahies (Fig. 3) 

 de Vries describes a fasciated condition 

 that reappeared year after year in every 

 season's growth of wood. Hus (1906) 

 gives similar facts regarding a specimen 

 of Rhus diversiloba. Repeated annual 

 fasciation is a charactistic of a specimen 

 of Sophor a secundiflora (Vasey, 1887) 

 described from Texas (Fig. 6). Rheum 

 moorcroftianum (W o r s d e 1 1 , 1905) 

 plants at Kew send up a number of 

 fasciated shoots each year. The sweet 

 potato^) regarded by Conard as a 

 constant fasciated race, has been pro- 

 pagated entirely asexually and in this 

 manner, the anomalous character is said 

 to have been so widely distributed, 



that in many areas unfasciated plants are difficult to find. Numerous 

 instances of a similar nature are recorded in connection with other woody 

 and herbaceous plants. 



Unless the situation were considered carefully, one might conclude 

 prematurely that in these plants the anomalous character is reproduced 

 through seed, but no one so far as I know has demonstrated this to 



Fig. 6. Fasciation in Sophora. 



(After Vasey. Photographed from 



a drawing in the Bot. Gazette.) 



^) One may consider fasciation in this case a bud sport and account satisfactorily 

 for its wide distribution asexually. 



