Chara Hispida Research Articles

The fruits vary considerably in size and shape, and represent in my opinion two, or possibly three, species. (1) The type to which most of the specimens belong resembles the fruit of the existing British Chara hispida , which it may well be. The length of the oogonium appears to be about 800 µ, but none of the full-grown specimens is perfect at the apex; the breadth=about 550 to 600 µ. It is usually broadest about the middle, and tapers slightly towards the base. The spiral cells show some eleven or twelve convolutions. (2) The single dark fruit is apparently a different species, about the length of the first, though narrower (500 µ), and broadest about the middle but sub-cylindrical; and the spiral cells show rather more convolutions. Another fruit, a lighter-coloured, imperfect specimen, may belong to the same species. (3) A single light-coloured specimen seems different from both 1 and 2. About as narrow as 2, but less cylindrical, tapering conspicuously at each extremity; length = probably about 82·5 µ; breadth = about 500 µ. The spiral cells would probably show twelve or thirteen convolutions. This might well belong to the existing species C. fragilis . The oospores seem, in all cases, to be well preserved. The fragments of stem and branches belong pretty certainly to a Chara of the section Diplostephanæ Diplostichæ, which includes C. hispida and C. vulgaris ; in thickness they agree more closely with the latter than with the former.

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