Flora of New Zealand Series

M. neozelandica (Zahlbr.) P.James in P.W. James & D.J. Galloway, Flora of Australia 54: 313 (1992).

≡Parmelia neozelandica Zahlbr., Cat. lich. univ. 6 (1): 53 (1929).

≡Parmelia nigrescens Stirt., Scott. Nat. 4: 253 (1878) non Ach.

=Menegazzia circumsorediata R.Sant., Ark. Bot. 30A (11): 14 (1942).

Holotype: New Zealand. Near Wellington, J. Buchanan – BM.

Menegazzia circumsorediata. Holotype: New Zealand. Southland, Fiordland, Deep Cove, Doubtful Sound, on Coprosma propinqua, 4.iii.1927, G. Einar & Greta Du Rietz 2075 : 1 – S.

Description : Flora (1985: 280 – as Menegazzia circumsorediata).

Chemistry : Medulla K+ yellow-orange, C−, KC+ orange, Pd+ orange; containing stictic, constictic, norstictic (tr.) and menegazziaic acids, atranorin (cortex) and accessory compounds.

N: Northland (Pandora) to Wellington. S: Nelson to Southland and Fiordland. St: Ch: (Te Pukaha). A: (Ewing I.). C: Ant.: Throughout, coastal and inland, on trees, shrubs and fenceposts, s.l. to 1200 m. In New Zealand this species has a wide ecological amplitude being common in dry Leptospermum shrubland as well as in damp, forested areas close to and both E and W of the Main Divide. Known also from western Tasmania, Argentina and Chile (James & Galloway 1992; Calvelo & Adler 1994; Calvelo 1998; Galloway & Quilhot 1999; Bjerke & Elvebakk 2001; Bjerke et al. 2003; McCarthy 2003c, 2006).

Austral

Exsiccati : Vězda (1982a: No. 1831).

Illustrations : Santesson (1942: 7, fig. 1 – as Menegazzia circumsorediata); James & Galloway (1992: 237, fig. 87D); Malcolm & Galloway (1997: 71); Bjerke & Elvebakk (2001: 367, fig. 2D).

Menegazzia neozelandica is a distinctive species in having sorediate perforations; soralia are rarely developed elsewhere on the thallus and are always few in number. M. subpertusa has a similar thallus but this species has a duller, more corrugated surface and the soralia are mostly not associated with the perforations. The Chilean species M. wandae Bjerke (Bjerke 2001) and the Tasmanian species M. kantvilasii P. James (James & Galloway 1992) differ from M. neozelandica in having pustulate soralia (not associated with laminal perforations) and different chemistries (thamnolic acid in M. wandae; stictic acid complex in M. kantvilasii).