Flora of New Zealand Series

Thallus dorsiventral, heteromerous, foliose-lobate, closely attached, corticolous. Lobes narrow 1-4 mm wide, sublinear to subirregular, margins generally ciliate. Upper surface with a paraplectenchymatous cortex and a pored epicortex. Lobules, isidia, maculae and soredia often present. Photobiont green, Trebouxia. Medulla white or pale yellow. Lower surface black, rarely pale, rhizinate. Rhizines black, rarely pale, simple to sparsely furcate or squarrose. Apothecia sessile, 5 mm or less in diam., disc imperforate, thalline exciple smooth, occasionally rhizinate. Ascospores simple, colourless, 8 per ascus, uniform within a given species and not notably different between unrelated species.

Parmelina, a generic segregate of Parmelia sens. lat.  [Hale Phytologia 29: 470-490 (1974); Smithson. Contr. Bot. 33: 1-60 (1976)], contains 47 described species, widely distributed in temperate and tropical regions. Five species are recorded from New Zealand. The genus is not well-defined and taxa presently included in it may be better placed in Hypotrachyna and/or Pseudoparmelia.