98 



does not mean that the work on tropical gill-fungi has been com- 

 pleted. Indeed, it has just begun, and collectors will now have a 

 basis on which to do more satisfactory work. Mexico has 

 hardly been touched and the same may be said for Santo^Dom- 

 ingo and many other parts of the West Indies, as well as nearly 

 all of Central America. Cuba is fairly well known from the 

 extensive collections of Charles Wright, and from the work of 

 many recent collectors. Martinique and Guadeloupe have 

 been rather thoroughly worked by Pere Duss who sent his col- 

 lections to Patouillard to be named. Jamaica is better known 

 mycologically than Porto Rico, so far as the larger fungi are con- 

 cerned, but both of these islands need to be worked more care- 

 fully. 



If a careful mycologist could spend half of his time in tropical 

 North America making specimens, notes and drawings, and the 

 remainder in a good herbarium and library working them up, 

 the results accomplished would be noteworthy. 



Dr. Murrill discussed at length the wide difference existing 

 between the species found in our tropics and in the temperate 

 regions of North America, and he described and tried to explain 

 the sporadic and scattered occurrence of the gill-fungi in portions 

 of the tropics that he had visited. Professor Fink, who has 

 recently been to Porto Rico, ascribes the infrequent occurrence 

 of the gill fungi there partly to the great tropical heat and also 

 to the fact that the development of the hymenophores is often 

 spread equally throughout the year, instead of taking place all 

 at once, as in colder climates." 



Adjournment followed. B. O. Dodge, Secretary 



NEWS ITEMS 



The Ecological Society of America in its Bulletin for March, 

 1 91 8 (Vol. 2, no. 3), gives a most interesting report from the 

 Committee on the Preservation of Natural Conditions for Eco- 

 logical Study. This Committee was appointed in the summer 

 of 191 7 and consists of twenty members who are seeking in- 

 formation for a card index of all important ecological areas 



