60
THE ESSEX NATURALIST.
Gills : cream, attenuated near stem, rounded in front, minutely emarginate
free, sometimes forked at base, all one length, crowded.
Stem : 6cm. in largest specimens, 4cm. in smaller, subcylindrica!, thickened
at base, white, or partly flushed with pink, turning blackish with
handling, spongy but not fragile.
Flesh : white, unchanging, pink under cuticle.
Smell none.
Taste: mild (or slightly bitter at first, sec. M & Z.).
Reaction to sulphate of iron : pink,
phenol : reddish brown.
Spore powder : pale yellow-ochre.
Spores : oval, warted, apiculate, 8-9 x 6-71/2 μ ; no reticulations visible.
Cystidia on edge of gills 45-50 x 8-10 μ, mostly with thread-like appendage,
either short or long.
Habitat : under beeches (in deciduous and coniferous woods, sec. M. & Z.)
This may very well be the same as Russula cutifracta in the sense of Rea
British Basidiomycetae) and Peltereau (B.S.M.F.), but in the original,
description of Cooke "R. cutefracta" is a very robust species with a purple
or greenish pileus and white gills ; therefore presumably with white spores,
though the colour of the spore-powder is not definitely stated. We all
know of Russulae with gills at first white and then yellow when the spores
develop, but must assume that this would have been mentioned by Cooke.
The cracking of the periphery in species of Russula is not uncommon,
the best known example being Russula virescens,which consistently shows a
pileus broken up into areolae. This phenomenon may occasionally be
observed in other species, notably in Russula vesca, where the gills have a
habit of growing a little beyond the edge of the periphery and sometimes
cause the cuticle of the pileus to crack. Doubtless the same thing happens
with other species. Most Continental mycologists consider that Russula
cutefracta of Cooke is a form of cyanoxantha. The colours of Cookes' figures
in his "Illustrations of British Fungi" certainly suggest this.
At the Foray we gathered some striking examples of a colour variety of
Russula cyanoxantha which does not appear in our books. The temptation
to create a new variety may be resisted, as the variability of this species is
notorious. It was, however, a surprise to see R. cyanoxantha with a vivid
purplish-violet stem. Only an examination of the characteristic spores
convinced one that we were dealing with this common species.
Miss Lister has written the following report on the myxomycetes found :
The route taken was from Loughton, keeping on higher ground than
usual, by Loughton Camp, Monk Wood to High Beach. The weather
was fine after a showery week, promising well for mycetozoa, yet the
results of hunting were not large. Only one specimen of the usually
abundant Badhamia utricularis was found, and that was in the plasmodium
stage. Perhaps the most interesting species was a good colony of Diderma
floriforme on dead wood ; when first gathered all the pearly grey sporangia
were perfect and unexpanded ; after being exposed for a short time in
the dry air of the exhibition room, the walls of most of the sporangia split
up into reflexed petal-like lobes exposing the dark dome-like masses of
spores. This species had not been recorded in the Forest more than
three or four times previously. The following is a list of the species seen:—