Flora of New Zealand Series

Thallus crustose, continuous to rimulose, subareolate-cracked to lacking, terricolous, saxicolous, corticolous or foliicolous. Photobiont green Cystococcus. Apothecia sessile to semi-immersed lecideine, pinkish to olive-brown to blackish, distinctly translucent when wet, disc concave, often deeply cupuliform to plane, matt or shining, smooth, margins well-developed, often over-arching disc, entire to crenulate-striate. Excipulum pachydermatous, hyphae septate, branched, densely conglutinate, colourless or pale. Hymenium 120-150 µm tall, colourless or pale. Paraphyses straight, simple or anastomosing, 0.8-1.5 µm thick, septate, apices slightly thickened. Asci cylindrical or clavate, walls thin, with a well-defined apical apparatus, 8-spored. Ascospores colourless, transversely septate to muriform, constricted at septa. Asci and hymenial gelatine brownish-yellow in I.

Gyalidea is a cosmopolitan genus of c. 13 described species included in the family Gyalectaceae [Vĕzda Folia geobot. phytotax 1: 311-340 (1966)]. Species are most commonly found on stones or soil in damp places and are easily overlooked. The fruits when wet are distinctly translucent, resembling a half-sucked winegum and are very characteristic. Two species are recorded here from New Zealand where the genus is still very poorly understood and needs further study and collection.