112 



Mycologia 



some time to come, unless some intrepid explorer should chance 

 to take a fancy to roughing it in Costa Rica. 



The soil is exceedingly rich, and vegetation is luxuriant. On 

 the Atlantic side the slope is gradual from the continental divide 

 to a wide stretch of marsh and low land along the coast, and 

 owing to the almost daily precipitation during every month in the 

 year it is a nearly impenetrable jungle of forest and swamp. On 

 the Pacific side of the divide the country is more mountainous, 

 forming a plateau dropping rapidly on its western border to the 

 Pacific coast, and with a well-marked dry season between No- 

 vember and April. This highland portion of the country has a 

 moderate climate in which not only coffee, the staple crop, and 

 other kinds of tropical vegetation flourish, but also potatoes, corn, 

 ~3reals and most of the garden vegetables of the temperate zone. 

 Under such conditions a native vegetation of extraordinary rich- 

 ness and diversity flourishes, which is allied somewhat more to 

 that extending southward into South America than to that ex- 

 tending northward. 



The only resident of Costa Rica who has paid attention to its 

 fungous flora, so far as the writer knows, is Sr. Adolfo Tonduz, 

 for many years associated with the Museo Nacional at San Jose. 

 He is the author of a pamphlet on the coffee-leaf disease caused 

 by a hyphomycete. In the following list he is credited with ten 

 collections, most of which were transmitted to the writer by Dr. 

 N. Patouillard, Neuilly-sur-Seine, France. He is an earnest 

 student of the general flora of the country. Phanerogamic col- 

 lections by him are to be found in many herbaria, and from three 

 of these collections specimens of rusts have been taken. 



Undoubtedly the best authority at present upon the higher 

 plants of Costa Rica is Mr. Henry Pittier, now at the National 

 Herbarium, Washington, D. C. He is the author of a botanical 

 handbook of 176 pages (Ensayo sobre las Plantas .Usuales de 

 Costa Rica. 1908), and has contributed studies of the native 

 flora to the " Contributions from the National Museum." Two 

 collections of rusts by him are mentioned in the following list, 

 both on the so-called Irish potato, as it is found growing wild 

 on the upper slopes of the Volcan de Irazu. 



