Page:Transactions NZ Institute Volume 15.djvu/321
II.—BOTANY.
Art. XXXI.—On the New Zealand Desmidieae. Additions to Catalogue and Notes on various Species. By W. M. Maskell, F.R.M.S.
[Read before the Philosophical Institute of Canterbury, 5th Ootober, 1882.]
Plates XXIV. and XXV.
The following paper consists of two parts:—First, a list, with descriptions and figures, of those plants which I have been able to add to my former catalogue; and secondly, notes upon some of the species described or mentioned in my paper, vol. XIII. of the Transactions, 1880, p. 297.
Several of the plants given in the following list have come to me in gatherings from Hawke's Bay, and I must express my thanks to Dr. Spencer, of Napier, who has kindly forwarded these gatherings, and in other ways materially assisted me. Indeed, strictly speaking, I have no right to include these in my paper: but Dr. Spencer informs me that he is not able this year to publish them. I understand that he proposes shortly to describe several new species in other families of Algæ.
In order to mark the plants so sent to me I have put after each the letter S, in all cases where I had not previously found the plant in Canterbury or elsewhere myself.
I have also to thank Professor Nordstedt, of Lund, for sending me papers of his upon Desmidieæ and other Algæ, which have been of great service; also Mr. Joshua, F.L.S., of Cirencester, England, who kindly sent me, a few months ago, a number of tubes containing gatherings of Algæ from various parts of England. In these tubes, although I have not yet thoroughly examined them, I have found, so far, more than fifty species of Desmidieæ, many of which are uncommon, and all have been of great use to me for comparison with the New Zealand forms.
My works of reference have been increased since 1880 by the addition of Rabenhorst's "Flora Europæa Algarum," Pritchard's "Infusoria," the "Annals and Magazine of Natural History," and others. Examination of these has not compelled me to abandon any of the species which I set down in my former paper as new, with the exception, perhaps, of Staurastrum (Didymocladon) stella and Docidium dilatatum. The former may possibly be S. furcigerum or S. sexangulare: the latter is said by Mr. Archer to be probably D. ovatum, Nordstedt.
I have been fortunate enough in the last two years to find some species of Desmidieæ in conjugation, with attached zygospores, notably Cosmarium