62 BRITISH GALLS 



rozeanum (of Lister), or Entendium splendens (of MacBride), 

 but what the ' fly ' is I do not know. The ways of Nature 

 are most curious. Here we have a fly that probably lays 

 its eggs only on this particular species of Myxomycetes, 

 and it is a plant that I have noted very rarely in the woods. 

 The common Lycogala epidendrum, which is a very similar 

 plant, was developed in abundance by the side of this 

 Enieridium, and not a specimen was affected. A mycologist 

 might confuse these two plants, but the fly knew them 

 apart. While it may be a well-known phenomenon to 

 the entomologists who study such things, these ' fly ' cases 

 in Myxomycetes seemed very strange to me." 



Lloyd's note is of special interest to me, because some 

 two or three years ago I found near Haslemere a Myxo- 

 mycete with similar tubes projecting from its surface. 

 From a cursory inspection of the specimen in the field I 

 thought it was a Lycogala. 1 noted that the tubes, which 

 I judged to be the cocoons of some dipterous insects, were 

 all empty; each had a small circular hole at the apex. 

 Unfortunately, my specimen was lost before its specific 

 identity was ascertained. It is highly probable that it was 

 an Entendium and not a Lycogala, and that Enteridium 

 is everywhere infested by a Dipteron which is at present 

 unknown. 



The necessity for careful investigation of the contents of 

 galls is emphasized by another note in the same number of 

 Lloyd's Mycohgical Notes. He points out that a fleshy 

 growth -on branches of the Southern Cypress {Taxodium 

 distichum) has been described by mycologists as Merulius 

 cupressi, Cyphella cupressi, and Cantkarellus cupressi. Though 

 Berkeley long ago said it was an insect production, Saccardo 

 placed it amongst the fungi. Lloyd received living specimens 

 from North Carolina, and remarks: "It did not take me long 

 to decide that Berkeley was right, and that it is an insect gall, 

 for the cellular structure is quite different from that we find 

 in fungi, and in addition I found on the inside of each 

 specimen a little orange grub. I sent specimens to Mr. 



