Solenopsora A.Massal.
Type : Solenopsora requienii A.Massal. [=S. holophaea (Mont.) Samp. (=Parmelia holophaea Mont.)]
Description : Thallus crustose, small-squamulose to placodioid with lobed margins, with or without a blue-black marginal prothallus. Photobiont green, chlorococcoid. Ascomata apothecia sessile; disc black (with or without a grey-blue pruina), pinkish brown, red-brown, yellowish brown to brown-black. Thalline margin present, sometimes becoming excluded with age. Epithecium yellow-brown to red-brown, with or without granules. Hymenium I+ blue, hyaline to red-brown. Hypothecium dense, hyaline to yellowish brown or reddish brown to orange-brown. Hamathecium of paraphyses, simple, 1.5–2 μm diam., apices swollen to 4–5 μm diam., often with an internal, brown cap. Asci clavate, 8-spored, Catillaria -type (Malcolm & Galloway 1997: 186) but sometimes with a small ocular chamber and appearing Bacidia -type. Ascospores colourless, ellipsoidal to fusiform, 1-septate, without a perispore. Conidiomata pycnidia, immersed in thallus. Conidia bacillar, simple, colourless, 3–4 × 0.5–1 μm.
Solenopsora, a genus of c. 14 species (Kantvilas 2004a), is included in the family Catillariaceae (Verdon & Rambold 1998; Eriksson et al. 2004; Kantvilas 2004a). Species show a wide range of morphologies with crustose, squamulose and small-foliose thalli known. All taxa in the genus are united by the following characters: 8-spored, Catillaria -type asci (i.e. having a prominent amyloid tholus without any internal differentiation, such as an axial body); simple, rather lax paraphyses with internally brown-pigmented, clavate apices; and colourless, 1-septate ascospores lacking a perispore (Verdon & Rambold 1998; Kantvilas 2004a). One species is known from New Zealand (Galloway 2004d) but the genus, like very many other crustose genera here, urgently requires further study and collection.
