28 



The Irish Naturalist. March, 1920. 



and a Roseate Cockatoo from Mrs. Browne. A Genet has been received 

 on deposit. A Guinea Baboon, a Bonnet Monkey, two Ringtail Coatis, 

 a Wolf, thirty Guinea-pigs, two Rheas, two Emus, a pair o^ Axolotls, 

 and six Spotted Salamanders have been purchased. The Fish Hatchery 

 is now again working, having been well stocked with Trout and Salmon 

 eggs. 



DUBLIN MICROSCOPICAL CLUB. 



January 14. — The Club met at Leinster House, the President (W. 

 F. Gunn) in the chair. 



Dr. G. H. Pethybridge exhibited the teleutospore stage of the rust 

 fungus Cronartium ribicola F. de Waldh. on leaves of Black Currant, 

 received from a nursery in Wexford. As is now well known this is one 

 of the stages in the hfe-cycle of the fungus which causes the so-called 

 " Bhster Rust " of the White and other five-leaved Pines. The spermo- 

 gonia and aecidia are produced on the stems and branches of these trees ; 

 and in this stage the fungus was known formerly as Peridermium Strobi 

 Kleb. The fungus was first found in England in 1892, but no record 

 of its appearance in Ireland has been traced up to the present. There 

 were no White Pine trees in or near the nursery from which the affected 

 leaves came, and a specimen tree of Pinus excelsa in the nursery showed 

 no signs of Blister Rust. Up to the present there appears to be no record 

 of the presence of Peridermium Strobi in Ireland. This rust has, in 

 recent years, reached North America, and the danger to the extensive 

 forests of White Pine in Canada and the United States is exceedingly 

 menacing. 



February ii. — The Club met at Leinster House. 



W. F. Gunn (President), in the chair, exhibited ripe sporangia of the 

 myxomycetous fungus Arcyria ferruginea showing the elastic capillitium. 

 The species has only been recorded from a few locaUties in Ireland, but 

 it will probably be found to be more widely distributed than present 

 records indicate. 



H. A. Lafferty exhibited microscopic preparations demonstrating the 

 method of seed infection in Flax " Browning " disease {Gloeosporium sp.). 

 The fungus enters the seed-boll either by way of the diseased stalk or 

 directly through the wall of the boll itself ; it permeates the tissues of 

 the placenta and by traversing tlie short funicle reaches the seed where 

 it becomes localised in the outer cells of the testa. 



Prof. J. A. Scott showed a very effective nu^tliod of dark ground 

 illumination. 



Prof. G. H. (\\ki'i:n i kk showed a section through the ovary of a 

 noctuid motli in whi( h the nutrient cells, with tlieir remarkable branched 

 nuclei, situated between tlic ova were clearly demonstrated. 



