Two Species of Conidiobolus Often Forming Zygospores Adjacent to Antheridium-like Distentions

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Abstract
Conidiobolus polyspermus was isolated by canopying Petri plates of maize-meal agar with leaf mold taken from oak woods in central Maryland. It grows rapidly, producing numerous conidia resembling those of the familiar Delacroixia coronata in their shape, size, and strong self-propulsion. On potato-dextrose agar it produces an abundance of large zygospores which at maturity show the internal structure most usual in members of the genus. Conidiobolus gonimodes, a species of generally smaller dimensions, came to light in Petri plates canopied with detritus from partly decayed herbaceous leaves collected in northern Illinois. Its conidia may germinate vegetatively, or produce a single secondary conidium, or give rise to a multiple progeny of microconidia. Its zygospores are formed more often than those of D. polyspermus through conjugation of neighboring segments, only rarely originating through conjugation between disjointed segments or between segments of separate hyphae. In both spp. the zygospore often develops adjacent to a distention in the contributing segment. A septum often eventually delimits this distention, but as the delimitation does not usually occur until conjugation is well advanced, the deposition of the wall would seem of no special significance.

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