MYCOLOGIA 



Vol. I July, 1909 No. 4 



STUDIES IN PYROPHILOUS FUNGI— I. THE 

 OCCURRENCE AND CULTIVATION OF 

 PYRONEMA 



Fred J. Seaver 

 (With Plates 9-12, Containing Twenty-one Figures) 



To the collector it is a well-known fact that there are numerous 

 species of fungi which are known only on burnt places. While 

 some of these forms may occur under other conditions, such 

 occurrence is so rare as to have attracted comparatively little atten- 

 tion. Many popular reasons have been offered by individuals in 

 explanation of these facts, such as the elimination of competition 

 in the destruction of the higher plants, the presence of carbon in the 

 soil, and that these forms really occur in other habitats and escape 

 detection, but none of these reasons is sufficient to explain the 

 occurrence of at least one of the plants in question. That these 

 fungi do not occur on burnt places simply because the competition 

 of the higher plants has been eliminated is shown by the fact that 

 they do not, as a rule, occur on bare soil which has not been 

 burned over. My own observation has also shown that carbo- 

 naceous materials are not necessary to the life of some of the 

 pyrophilous fungi, and we must look for other explanations of 

 these interesting phenomena. 



The genus Pyronema includes several species, which, as the 

 name implies, commonly inhabit burnt places. The occurrence of 

 the plants of this genus on burnt ground is sufficiently common 



[Mycologia for May, 1909 (1 : 83-130), was issued 4 June 1909.] 



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