Fungi of Chandigarh

The earliest record of a fungus from Chandigarh and its surrounding areas is that of Colletotrichum sp. causing leaf spot disease of Achras sapota L. (Gulati, 1964). Since then there are few published reports dealing with the systematic studies on the fungi of this area. These pertain to taxa belonging to Myxomycetes (Sekhon, 1976, 1978, 1979a and b and Sekhon & Thind, 1980), saprolegniales (Rawla & Prasher, 1986), Polyporaceae (Ryvarden & Dhanda, 1975) and Agaricales (Rawla et al.; 1982, 1983 and 1987; Rawla and Arya, 1991 and Sarwal, 1984). Keeping in mind the scanty literature available on the occurance, distribution and taxonomy of fungi of Chandigarh and adjoining areas (refered to as area onwards), the studies were initiated to describe the fungi of this area. In this volume; which forms a part of this on going study; fungi belonging to Myxomycetes (Myxomycota) and Saprolegniaceae, Saprolegniales (Oomycota) are fully described and illustrated. The present compilation actually represents a small percentage of the fungi present in this area but can be regarded as a foundation for future studies. In this work 26 genera of Myxomycetes spreading over 85 species and 2 genera of Saprolegniaceae (Oomycota) representing 11 species have been fully described and illustrated. The fungi belonging to Myxomycetes have been identified and keyed out after Martin and Alexopoulos (1969), Alexopoulos (1973), Thind (1977) and Lakhanpal and Mukerji (1981) whereas the taxa belonging to Saprolegniaceae have been identified after Johanson (1956). Sparrow (1960) and Seymour (1970)."