ITALIC 8.0

Micarea hedlundii Coppins

Bull. Brit. Mus. Nat. Hist., Bot. ser., 11: 135, 1983.

Synonyms:

Distribution: N - Ven (Nascimbene & al. 2013b), TAA (Thor & Nascimbene 2007, Nascimbene & al. 2022).

Description: Thallus crustose, episubstratic, effuse, olive-green, minutely granular, composed of 20-40 µm wide goniocysts containing orange granules reacting K+ and C+ violet. Apothecia very rare, micareoid, 0.2-0.5 mm across, often aggregated in tuberculate, up to 1 mm wide clusters, pale brown to grey-brown, with a strongly convex disc, without a proper margin. Proper exciple indistinct; epithecium yellowish brown, K+ violet; hymenium colourless, often with irregular, brownish vertical streaks reacting K+ violet; paraphyses rather scanty, hyaline, branched and anastomosing, 0.8-1.5 μm thick, the apical cells only slightly wider; hypothecium colourless to yellowish, 80-130 μm high. Asci 8-spored, clavate to cylindrical-clavate, in K/I with a blue outer layer and apical dome and unstained wall, the dome with an apical cushion. Ascospores 0(-1)-septate, hyaline, ellipsoid, ovoid or oblong, 6.5-12 x 2.5-4.5 μm. Pycnidia stalked, cylindrical, usually unbranched, often extruding a whitish mass of conidia, 0.2-0.5(-1) mm tall, the stalk pink-brown or grey-brown, but covered in a whitish tomentum, the wall K+ and C+ violet. Mesoconidia narrowly ellipsoid, 4-6 x 1.2-1.7 μm. Photobiont micareoid, thin-walled, the cells 4-7 μm wide. Spot tests: thallus K- or K-+ faintly violet, C- or C+ faintly violet, P- (reactions best visible under the microscope). Chemistry: thallus with unknown orange droplets reacting K+ and C+ violet.

Note: a rather rare species growing on wood (mostly on the vertical surfaces of stumps) and rotting roots of conifers in montane to subalpine forests, ranging from the Alps to Northern Europe. It is included in the Italian red list of epiphytic lichens as “Critically Endangered” (Nascimbene & al. 2013c).

Growth form: Crustose

Substrata: lignum

Photobiont: green algae other than Trentepohlia

Reproductive strategy: mainly sexual, or asexual by conidia and thalloconidia

Commonnes-rarity: (info)

Alpine belt: absent

Subalpine belt: extremely rare

Oromediterranean belt: absent

Montane belt: extremely rare

Submediterranean belt: absent

Padanian area: absent

Humid submediterranean belt: absent

Humid mediterranean belt: absent

Dry mediterranean belt: absent

pH of the substrata:

1

2

3

4

5

(info)

Solar irradiation:

1

2

3

4

5

(info)

Aridity:

1

2

3

4

5

(info)

Eutrophication:

1

2

3

4

5

(info)

Poleotolerance:

0

1

2

3

(info)

Altitudinal distribution:

1

2

3

4

5

6

(info)

Predictive model

Herbarium samples

Index Fungorum GBIF

Andres Saag - CC BY-SA NC - Source: http://esamba.bo.bg.ut.ee/checklist/est-img/browserecord.php?-action=browse&-recid=2155