676 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXIX. No. 747 



tion, and would thus contribute materially to 

 the stability of mycological nomenclature. 



ElIAS J. DURAND 



Botanical Depabtment, 

 Cornell Univebsity 



SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES 



THE BIOLOGICAL SOCIETT OF WASHINGTON 



The 456tli meeting was held March 6, 1909, 

 with President Palmer in the chair. Dr. Theodore 

 Gill offered some notes on oral gestation in cichlid 

 fishes. He said that there was much to learn 

 about the habits of American cichlids and espe- 

 cially about their buccal incubation. Professor 

 Putnam as long ago as 1863, in the Proceedings 

 of the Boston Society of Natural History (p. 

 226), remarked that "in the genus Bagrus [really 

 Arius] Professor Wyman found that it was the 

 male that took charge of the eggs, while in the 

 Chromoids [i. e., Cichlids] it is the female. The 

 specimens in which this peculiar fact was noticed 

 were presented to the Museum of Comparative 

 Zoology by Rev. J. C. Fletcher, from the Rio 

 Negro, and by Professor Wyman, from Surinam. 

 In these specimens the eggs ana young were found 

 in all stages of development." 



This statement has been universally overlooked 

 and various authors, especially Lortet and 

 Giinther, maintained that it was the male that 

 took charge of the eggs, and not till 1902 and 

 later did Boulenger and Pellegrin demonstrate 

 that it was always the female of Syrian and 

 African cichlids that did so. There was much 

 uncertainty about the American species and the 

 genus comprising the " two species " observed by 

 Putnam was not named. It was probably Geo- 

 phagus. 



Very recently, in an article on the " Freshwater 

 Fishes of French Guiana" extracted from the 

 Revue Colomale, Dr. Pellegrin claimed that it was 

 the male of the American Geophagi that nurses 

 the eggs ; his words are " Chez les G^ophages 

 amfiricains o'est le male qui se charge ainsi des 

 soins a donner aux ceufs et aux jeunes; chez les 

 Cichlides africains comme les Tilapies, c'est la 

 femelle ainsi que M. Boulenger et moi I'avons 

 montrS." 



It is improbable that the American species dif- 

 fer so decidedly from the African and the neg- 

 lected half-century-old observations of Wyman 

 and Putnam deserve resurrection. Perhaps the 

 specimens observed are still in the Museum of 

 Comparative Zoology and can be identified by 

 Mr. Garman or Professor Eigenmann. Agassiz 

 in his " Journey to Brazil " in 1865 made some 



obsei-vations but did not state whether the egg- 

 carrying individuals were females or males. 



Now that much attention is being paid to the 

 breeding habits of fishes, we may hope that defi- 

 nite observations will soon be made of American 

 cichlids. Some, indeed, have been published by 

 German aquarists which appear to show that 

 there may be considerable difi'erence in the habits 

 of the species, but the information is still unsatis- 

 factory. May this note serve to elicit more defi- 

 nite data. 



Dr. L. 0. Howard referred to the importation 

 oi the brown tail moth accompanying seedlings 

 from France. It is a practise of American nur- 

 serymen to buy seedlings from the north of 

 France. Thirty per cent, of a recent shipment 

 carried the winter nests of the moth. There is 

 no national inspection law in this coimtry and 

 the stock had become widely distributed before its 

 infection was known. Much of it was later traced 

 and destroyed under state laws. An old federal 

 law forbids the carrying of such infected stock 

 in vessels, and steamship companies after a warn- 

 ing are now more careful in this respect. A pro- 

 test from the French nurserymen alleged that the 

 brown tail moth would not thrive in our northern 

 states, and was already common in the southern 

 states. But the fact is that in this country the 

 moth is a great pest in the northern states to 

 which it is confined. 



The chair referred to the reservation by execu- 

 tive proclamation under the Monuments Act of 

 several regions containing objects of scientific in- 

 terest. The recent creation by President Roosevelt 

 of the Mt. Olympus National Monument in the 

 Olympic Mountains of Washington, the home of 

 the Roosevelt elk, is the first of its kind having 

 a zoological as well as geological interest. 



Dr. Evermann called attention to a recent act 

 of Congress which provides for the establishment 

 of a biological station at Fairport, Iowa. An 

 appropriation of $25,000 for the establishment of 

 this station was made a year ago and recently 

 Congress passed the item providing for the per- 

 sonnel. The site has been definitely selected at 

 Fairport, Iowa, where the bureau has acquired 

 sixty acres of land admirably suited to the pur- 

 pose. About fifty acres of the land lies along the 

 river front and is exceedingly well adapted to the 

 construction of the necessary ponds, of which 

 there will be several acres. Near the river front 

 is a railroad used by two companies with a num- 

 ber of trains each way daily, thus affording ade- 

 quate railroad facilities. Some 1,800 feet from 

 the river front is a public highway connecting 



