UK Fungi

It seems to be very difficult to partition between more fine Ramalina farinacea morphs and R. pollinaria s. lat. The best guide that I can make out is the sorlia remain delimited and elliptical in the former and they extend and become irregular in the latter (which is the distinctive character liste...

Jenny Yes it did look a bit odd, but the UV+ test for these is very bright white and rules out most other leafy Parmeliaceae, except unlikely species such as some Xanthoparmelia species, Arctoparmelia , Montanelia disjuncta , Parmotrema arnoldii and Cetrelia cetrarioides , so I thought that must be ...

Jenny That is intriguing, not a species I was aware of. See https://italic.units.it/index.php?procedure=taxonpage&num=680 for a description and a link to GBIF, showing it to be a Mediterranean – south Atlantic species reaching north to Brittany, so quite likely in SW Britain. I would have overlo...

Jenny Thanks for that, I am sure we will add that to a revision when one is needed. The keys tend to assume dry material, but the difference between wet and dry colours can get confused. I spotted some in Cladonia when editing it, where the range of colours given was actually one colour dry and anot...

Sylvia Yes that is Zwackhia prosodea , I would identify that material on the macro characters in the field, but the very long spores are distinctive if there is enough to take a single or few apothecia. More pictures at https://britishlichensociety.org.uk/resources/species-accounts/zwackhia-prosodea...

Cadonia symphycarpa is a rare, normally sterile, Cladonia forming squamule mats in open vegetation on calcareous soils from the coast to montane habitats. It has been characterised in Britain by a K+ yellow to red spot test with crystals forming under the microscope (norstictic acid), although many...

Hendrik

Thanks for that, very interesting, which a good deal of overlap in the associated lichens but much less so with the vascular plants, not surprisingly. Nice to see the podetia; would it be OK to put these up on the BLS website?

Neil

They do seem a bit doubtful as schizidia, as your picture shows, they appear to mainly function as apothecia initials.

As for reactions, the UV+ orange test is so good and definitive I have not used the spot tests for a long time, so not sure how reliable they are.

Neil

Just to let people know that Janet has put version 7 of the BLS Spreadsheet up for download on the BLS website https://britishlichensociety.org.uk/recording/downloads . Lots of updated names, so no more having to retype in the old names for species like Snippocia nivea after copying in species lists...

Paul

No problem, I can hand over at the BLS east Hampshire meeting.

Neil

I have what appears to be Refractohilum peltigerae parasitising Peltigera didactyla in heathland from Snelsmore Common in Brekshire. It was forming galls on the surface of the Peltigera didactyla , with the conidiophores projecting from gall surface and producing simple conidia 18 – 20 x 7 – 8µm. Th...

I have had a request for a lichen survey of Heene Cemetery in Worthing, by the Friends of Heene Cemetery, see www.heenecemetery.org.uk . This is a small-scale volunteer project that includes species recording, but they have very few lichen records and would like to get more. I am not very experience...