Teloschistes chrysophthalmus (L.) Th.Fr.
Lichen chrysophthalmus L., Mant. Pl.: 311 (1771).
Thallus foliose to fruticose, in small clumps, to 4 cm diam., and 0.5-2 cm tall, usually formed from single plants, corticolous. Lobes at first stellate-radiate, 0.5 mm wide, becoming erect, branched, rigid, dorsiventral, to 2.5 mm wide with spinous marginal fibrils, golden or orange-yellow above, especially at ends of lobes, matt or slightly shining, smooth or weakly longitudinally ridged, white or in part yellow below, longitudinally veined and wrinkled. Apothecia pedicellate, marginal or at ends of small laciniae, 1-6 mm wide, nearly plane, becoming convex with age, disc orange-yellow, margins thin, slightly elevated, with up to 150 concolorous fibrils, 0.5-2 mm long. Ascospores ellipsoid, 10-15 × 5-8 µm.
N: Auckland to Wellington. S: Nelson to Southland. Widely distributed in lowland and primarily urban habitats in coastal areas where it is a frequent epiphyte of exotic trees, especially of fruit trees.
Cosmopolitan
Although most often collected from exotic trees and shrubs, T. chrysophthalmus in northern New Zealand is commonly an epiphyte of Avicennia resinifera and the leaves of Agathis australis. Elsewhere in its range it is an epiphyte of Carmichaelia, Discaria, Hebe, Hymenanthera, Lophomyrtus obcordata, Muehlenbeckia complexa, Plagianthus divaricatus and Sophora spp.
The several varieties and forms recorded by Murray ( loc. cit. ) are merely habitat modifications of a species which has a rather variable thallus colour depending on the degree of exposure to sunlight. Shade forms are grey-green while specimens in full sunlight are typically orange-yellow.
