Xanthoparmelia norcapnodes
≡Paraparmelia norcapnodes Elix & J. Johnst., Mycotaxon 32: 406 (1988).
Description : Thallus loosely adnate to adnate, to 10 cm diam. Lobes imbricate, sublinear to irregular, irregularly branched, 1–4 mm wide, rarely developing laciniae at centre, 0.4–1 mm diam.; apices subrotund. Upper surface grey to dark-grey and ±blackening, glossy towards apices, elsewhere dull, margins often blackened, apices brown-tinged, mostly flat, smooth, but developing transverse cracks and becoming wrinkled; isidiate, without maculae or soredia. Isidia dense centrally, scattered on marginal lobes, cylindrical, slender, becoming coralloid branched, apices intact, syncorticate. Medulla white. Lower surface wrinkled, black, sometimes brown towards margins; rhizines sparse to moderately dense, simple, black. Apothecia sessile to subpedicellate, to 5 mm diam., disc concave at first becoming undulate-distorted, pale-brown to dark-brown, not fissured; margins thin, involute then undulate, isidiate. Ascospores ellipsoidal, 8–10 × 5–6 μm. Conidia bifusiform, 5–6 × 1 μm.
Chemistry : Cortex K+ yellow; medulla K+ yellow→dark-red, C−, Pd+ orange; containing atranorin, and norstictic (major), connorstictic (minor or tr.), ±constipatic, and ±protoconstipatic acids.
N: Northland (Three Kings Is). On coastal rocks. Still very poorly known in New Zealand. Known also from SE Australia (Elix 2001b: 137–138; McCarthy 2003c, 2006).
Australasian
Illustrations : Elix & Johnston (1988a: 405, fig. 8); Elix (2001b: 139, fig. 75) – as Paraparmelia norcapnodes.
Xanthoparmelia norcapnodes is characterised by: the saxicolous habit (coastal rocks); the loosely adnate to adnate thallus; the often dark-grey or grey-black upper surface; the black lower surface; the copiously developed cylindrical isidia which become coralloid-branched; and the distinctive medullary chemistry with norstictic acid as major metabolite. It is similar to X. atrocapnoides, but this species has a different chemistry (see above).
