J~7 , 0. S' 
THE FIMETARIALES OF OHIO 
By 
ROBERT STRATTON 
INTRODUCTION* 
Although some knowledge of the Fimetariales had been gained by 
special work as an undergraduate student in 1914, actual work for the 
preparation of this paper was not begun until the fall of 1916. Since only 
one species, Fimetaria fimicola, belonging to this order has been reported 
for Ohio, so far as is known by the author, it seemed desirable to determine 
how numerous these plants were in this area. While the chief aim was to 
catalogue the species found, yet, the author, unless otherwise stated, has 
completely rewritten the descriptions from his own data with careful 
attention, of course, to the diagnoses given by others. 
Profiting by the knowledge gained by Griffiths, namely, that by using 
moist chambers, cultures of the more delicate forms, which would 
ordinarily escape observation in the field, as well as the more hardy ones, 
could be obtained in the laboratory from material collected in any locality, 
letters were sent in the fall of 1914 to about thirty-five botanists and 
friends living in different parts of the state. They were asked to send old 
dry material of different kinds of dung. Replies were received from about 
ten, of whom only a few sent material. 
Old material was especially mentioned in the letters because the 
experience of previous workers has shown that it is the most productive 
when placed under proper conditions for the development of these fungi. 
This is probably true for two reasons: (1) the older the material, the more 
likely it is to contain spores of one or more species; (2) crops produced by 
successive intervals of moisture cover the substratum with spores so that 
each successive production is heavier than the previous one. 
In the work of 1914 the author not only gained some idea of the 
group as a whole and the manner of obtaining material, but also became 
familiar with about ten different species of the group. No attempt, 
however, was made at that time to describe the species or to make sketches 
of them. Thus these species had to be restudied for the present paper 
and descriptions had to be made. 
The following friends and botanists have contributed material from 
the localities designated: Miss Cora March, Wyoming, per Wm. Schaeffer 
and Fred Brater; Maximilian Braam, Cincinnati; E. L. Moseley, Sandusky; 
M. E. Stickney, Granville; W. G. Stover, Oxford, Columbus, and Buckeye 
•Contributions from the botanical laboratory of Miami University.—XVII. 
75 
