Bactrospora metabola
Common name
Fly’s Graveyard Lichen
Family
Roccellaceae
Flora category
Lichen – Native
Endemic taxon
No
Endemic genus
No
Endemic family
No
Structural class
Lichens - Crustose
Current conservation status
2018 | At Risk – Naturally Uncommon | Qualifiers: DP, SO
Brief description
Inconspicuous white crutose lichen with black wavy margin. Surface covered in small dish-shaped black, fruiting bodies.
Distribution
Indigenous. New Zealand: North and South Islands. Also known from Australia (Tasmania), the Andaman Islands, New Caledonia and Papua New Guinea.
Habitat
Corticolous on the bark of Cordyline spp., Hoheria spp., Kunzea spp., Metrosideros spp., Pseudopanax spp., and conifers such as Dacrydium cupressinum. Often co-habiting with other crustose taxa such as Bactrospora arthonioides, Chiodecton colensoi and species of Arthonia, Opegrapha and Thelotrema
Detailed description
Corticolous, crustose lichen. Thallus white, spreading, continuous to areolate forming patches 20–100 mm diameter; generally delimited by a wavy, black prothallus, with the surface covered in scattered, rounded, semi-immersed to adnate or sessile apothecia (constricted at base). Apothecia black, epruinose, convex and usually immarginate. Internally, apothecia bearing dichotomously branched paraphysoids; these loosely interlaced and with few or no anastomoses. Asci broadly pyriform. Ascospores colourless, muriform ascospores (homalotropa-type). Chemistry: No chemistry detected.
Similar taxa
Differs from other Bactrospora by the ascospores which are muriform at maturity (up to 27 transversely septate), of the Homalotropa-type, 55-110 × 8-14 µm.
Substrate
Corticolous
Attribution
Fact sheet prepared by Peter J. de Lange (19 August 2021). Brief description and similar taxa sections based on Galloway (1985, 2007) but updated.
References and further reading
Galloway D.J. 1985: Flora of New Zealand: Lichens. Wellington: PD Hasselberg, Government Printer. 662 pp.
Galloway D.J. 2007: Flora of New Zealand: Lichens, including lichen-forming and lichenicolous fungi. 2nd edition. Lincoln, Manaaki Whenua Press. 2261 pp.
NZPCN Fact Sheet citation
Please cite as: de Lange, P.J. (Year at time of access): Bactrospora metabola Fact Sheet (content continuously updated). New Zealand Plant Conservation Network. https://www.nzpcn.org.nz/flora/species/bactrospora-metabola/ (Date website was queried)