Flora of New Zealand Series

≡Callopisma luteoalbum β lacteum A.Massal., Sched. Crit. 7: 133 (1855).

=Blastenia colensoi Müll.Arg., Bot. J. Linn. Soc. 32: 206 (1895).

=Blastenia albidoflavida Zahlbr., Denkshr. Akad. Wiss. Wien math.-naturwiss. Kl. 104: 365 (1941).

=Caloplaca blastenioides Zahlbr., Denkshr. Akad. Wiss. Wien math.-naturwiss. Kl. 104: 369 (1941).

Blastenia colensoi. Holotype: New Zealand. Hawke's Bay, Napier, on pebbles, W. Colenso 1729 – BM.

Blastenia albidoflavida. Type: New Zealand. Canterbury, Castle Hill Basin, c. 600 m, on limestone, J.S. Thomson T3970 – CH, OTA, W.

Caloplaca blastenioides. Lectotype: New Zealand. Canterbury, Castle Hill, on limestone, J.S. Thomson T 1610 [ZA 46] – CHR 373788 [fide Galloway (1985a: 63)].

Description : Thallus thin, granular-furfuraceous or lacking, forming a whitish stain or completely immersed, without a prothallus, often reduced to scattered granules around the apothecia. Apothecia common, widely dispersed to contiguous, sessile, constricted at base, rounded to contorted through mutual pressure, (0.05–)0.1–0.3(–0.5) mm diam., sometimes dying and leaving shallow pits; disc orange to ferrugineous brown-red, plane to subconcave, rarely convex and immarginate with age. Margins persistent, orange, entire, elevated, concolorous with disc. Hymenium 70–80 μm tall; epithecium brownish yellow, K+ purple. Paraphyses moniliform at ends, apical cell clavate. Asci clavate, 55–65 × 13–17 μm. Ascospores ellipsoidal to broadly ellipsoidal, 2-locular, 12.5–17.5(–20) × (5–) 6–7.5(–10) μm; septum 1–2 μm thick, c. ⅓ length of spore.

Chemistry : Apothecia K+ violet-red: containing parietin (major) and lesser amounts of emodin, fallacinol, fallacinal, xanthorin and erythroglaucin (Santesson 1970: 2155).

N: Northland (Ninety Mile Beach), Hawke's Bay (Napier), Wellington (Buchanan, BM). S: Nelson (Ure Valley), Marlborough (Kaikoura Peninsula), Canterbury (Motunau, Corrie Downs, Castle Hill), Otago (Blueskin Bay), Southland (Castle Rock near Dipton). A basicolous species found on sunny, exposed limestone outcrops, and calcareous sandstone, inland and coastal and also on shells in shell middens. Commonly associating with Caloplaca holocarpa, Lecanora dispersa, Physcia caesia and Sarcogyne regularis. Known also from Great Britain, Europe, Scandinavia, Greenland, North Africa, Israel, Turkey, Ukraine, North America and Australia (Hansen et al. 1987a; Laundon 1992; Nimis 1993; Santesson 1993; Esslinger & Egan 1995; Wirth 1995; Egea 1996; Galun & Mukhtar 1996; Kondratyuk et al. 1996a, 1996b, 1998; Scholz 2000; Navarro-Rosinés & Hladun 1996; Seaward 1996; Fletcher & Coppins 2001h; Hafellner & Türk 2001; Llimona & Hladun 2001; McCarthy 2003c, 2006; Nimis & Martellos 2003; Santesson et al. 2004).

?Cosmopolitan

Illustrations : Wade (1965: 3, fig. 10); Wirth (1987: 93; 1995b: 234); Kärnefelt (1989: 167, fig. 28); Foucard (1990: 104); Laundon (1992: 145, fig. 7C); Dobson (1992: 80; 2000: 95; 2005: 104).

Caloplaca lactea is characterised by: the saxicolous habit (basicolous rocks); a white or ±obsolete thallus; brown-red apothecia (often somewhat immersed in substratum); and characteristic broadly ellipsoidal ascospores that have very large locules separated by a narrow septum. Closely related species in the C. lactea group are discussed in a table in Navarro-Rosinés et al. (2001: 37).