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LICHEN NOTES No. 2. 
G. K. Merrill. 
It is no unusual event for the collector to observe lichen species growing 
in situations utterly discordant with their natural habitat, but the recent 
finding by the writer of Umbilicaria pustulata, Hoffm., b. papulosa. Tuck., 
attached to one of the lower limbs of a young spruce seems worthy of a few 
words 
Itis to be noted that the genus Umbilicaria is typically saxicoline, and the 
occurrence of an individual on any other substratum is distinctly a departure 
from habit. The plant was normal in appearance, well fruited, perhaps 60 
mm. in major diameter, firmly attached to the branch, and apparently in no 
wise physiologically affected by its untoward surroundings. The branch 
was four feet from the earth, living and thrifty, and the tree was one of 
numbers growing in the vicinity. The locality was ledgy and numerous 
outcroppings supported myriad Umbilicariae of similar and diverse species. 
Speculating on how the plant received its start in an uncongenial habitat, it 
is inconceivable that it should have been a nomad. While well known that 
fragments of lichen thallus, wind blown or moved by other agencies, may 
and do become attached to new supports, it is equally a fact that the anchor- 
age of the Umbilicariae is very secure whether in their younger stages or as 
matured. Then again we have no observations to prove that a new attach- 
ment may be formed once the old is broken, either through the same umbili- 
cus or by growth of a new one. It seems a safe conclusion that our plant 
originated precisely as others of its kind do, and in situ. It has been men- 
tioned that the spruce was a young tree, and the consideration suggests itself 
that a fairly accurate idea of the lichen’s age might be deduced should that 
of the tree be ascertained. This was found to be slightly less than thirty 
years, but the information in establishing one limit fails to furnish a mimi- 
mum. While reasonable to infer that from the branch being one of the 
largest, it was also one of the oldest, assumption can scarcely go further, and 
certainly not to that limit of fixing a time for the meeting of the proto- thal- 
line film with its algal affinity. We can be sure that the tree had passed its 
juvenile stage, that the branch had acquired some size and a developed cor- 
tex. All this may have acquired ten years ; if so, how extraordinarily moder- 
ate are the functional activities of a lichen only attaining to a diameter of 60 
mm. in twenty years. That lichens derive their inorganic components from 
the substrata has long been asserted, the rhizoids supposedly furnishing the 
deus ex machina . If this be true of Umbilicaria (it seems incredible) our 
plant evidently found the assimilated products of the host branch entirely to 
its liking, and if so,' why should it have been unattended? Why not 
more individuals on the same branch, other branches of the same tree, or 
other trees of the same species and locality? Indeed the same interrogations 
might be made if it were a known fact that lichens derive their nutrition 
solely from meteoric sources. 
A very curious lichen received during the summer of 1904 from Mrs. L. 
A. Carter, of Laconia, N. H., finds a name, the result of a recent examina- 
