318 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XLIII. No. 1105 



development of individuals in Great Britain 

 and New Zealand. Even on continents we 

 may notice the same dearth of ants in cool, 

 humid regions, as, e. g., in the Selkirk Moun- 

 tains of British Columbia as compared with 

 the Rockies of Alberta. The former moun- 

 tains, which are very humid and covered with 

 a rich vegetation, have a much poorer ant 

 fauna than the latter, which are drier and 

 have a more meager flora, though sufficiently 

 moist and warm to afford optimum conditions 

 for ants during the summer months. 



In addition to a great amount of taxonomic 

 and purely descriptive material Donisthorpe's 

 book contains many original observations on 

 the behavior of ants, especially in the sections 

 devoted to the species of Lasius (notably L. 

 fuUginosus and umhratus) and the blood-red 

 slavemaker (Formica sanguinea). The illus- 

 trations are excellent and abundant and, with 

 few exceptions, have been specially prepared 

 for the volume. Most interesting are the 

 figures of the gynandromorphs and ergatan- 

 dromorphs of Formica rufiharhis, F. sanguinea 

 and Myrmica scairinodis (PI. IV. and Figs. 

 45 and 46) and of the mrymithogyne of Lasius 

 flavus (Fig. 47). 



The only matter open to criticism in the 

 volume is, perhaps, Donisthorpe's too hasty 

 adoption of the generic name DonistJiorpea 

 for Lasius. The genus Lasius was based by 

 Fabricius in 1804 on Formica nigra L., the 

 common garden ant, one of the most abundant 

 insects of the northern hemisphere, and since 

 that date universally known, both in technical 

 and popular literature, as Lasius niger. In 

 1914 Morice and Durrant exlaimied a paper by 

 Jurine published in 1801, in which the name 

 Lasius was assigned to a genus of bees. The 

 authors therefore renamed the ant-genus 

 DonistJiorpea. It seems, however, that there 

 is serious doubt concerning the status of 

 Jurine's paper, so that we need not be in a 

 hurry to make this deplorable change in our 

 nomenclature. At any rate, it will probably be 

 difficult to persuade the majority of living 

 myrmecologists, including Forel, Emery and 

 the reviewer, to substitute DonistJiorpea nigra 

 for Lasius niger, a name which for more than 

 a century has been almost as much of a house- 



hold term as Musca domestica, Equus cahallus 

 and Canis familiaris. W. M. Wheelee 



SPECIAL ARTICLES 



THE IMPORTANCE OF BACTERIUM BULGARI- 

 CUS GROUP IN ENSILAGE 



This department has been investigating the 

 microbial flora of different kinds of ensilage 

 at various stages of fermentation throughout 

 the past year. The presence of Bacterium 

 Bulgaricus group was first observed from the 

 preliminary examinations of miscellaneous 

 samples of ensilage. Since that time several 

 hundred bacteriological analyses have been 

 made from different kinds of ensilage, and at 

 all stages of fermentation. The results ob- 

 tained offer sufficient evidence to indicate the 

 importance of this Bulgarian group in the 

 ripening of normal ensilage. In a review of 

 the literature relating to microorganisms of 

 ensilage, only one reference^ could be found 

 which mentions the presence of Bacterium 

 Bulgaricus group. The reference in question 

 cites ensilage, along with many other sub- 

 stances, only as a source from which Bacterium 

 Bulgaricus has been isolated. 



Plate cultures, made upon acidulated glucose 

 agar, were used for the cultivation of this 

 group. The acid (1 cc. of a 1 per cent, sterile 

 acetic acid solution) was added directly to the 

 plates and mixed with the glucose agar when 

 the latter was poured into the plates. The 

 cultures were incubated at 35°C. for four days. 

 The media permitted the growth of practically 

 only two groups of microorganisms ; the " acid 

 group " and yeasts. The colonies of the latter 

 were always few in number, if present at all, 

 and with a little practise could be easily differ- 

 entiated from the Bulgarian group. 



The Bulgarian colonies showed varying de- 

 grees of size and form. In size, the colonies 

 appear as very minute forms scarcely visible 

 to the naked eye, to a type as large as the 

 average lactic acid colony, and often larger. 



In form, the characteristic "woolly edge" 

 colony was frequent, but the predominating 

 type was very similar to the common Bac- 



i"A Study of B. Bulgaricus," P. G. Heine- 

 mann and M. Hifferan, Jour. Inf. Diseases, Vol. 

 6, No. 3, June 12, 1909. 



