Flora of New Zealand Series

≡Lichen spongiosus Sm. in J.E. Smith & J. Sowerby, Engl. Bot.: tab. 1374 (1804).

Descriptions : Flora (1985: 528–529). See also Galloway (1998b: 142).

Chemistry : TLC−, all reactions negative.

S: Nelson (Mt Mytton, Cobb Valley, Blue Creek Gorge, Sunshine Ridge Mt Owen Ra., Mt Owen), Southland (Lake Orbell Murchison Mts). On limestone outcrops in subalpine scrub spreading over soil or in crevices of limestone, 790–1340 m, among bryophytes and the lichens Arthrorhaphis alpina, Lepraria neglecta, Steinera neozelandica etc. Known also in the Southern Hemisphere from Tierra del Fuego (near Ushuaia) and James Ross I., Antarctica (Lewis Smith & Øvstedal 1994; Øvstedal & Lewis Smith 2001). In the Northern Hemisphere it is a circumpolar, arctic-alpine lichen known from Great Britain, Sweden, Norway, Italy, Austria, Greenland, Tibet, the United States, Canada, East Africa and Japan (Purvis et al. 1992; Santesson 1993; Goward et al. 1994b; Hansen 1995; Brodo et al. 2001; Coppins 2002b; Nimis & Martellos 2003; Obermayer 2004; Ryan & Vitikainen 2004; Santesson et al. 2004).

Bipolar

Illustrations : Jahns (1980: 229); Thomson (1984: 391); Goward et al. (1994b: 125, fig. 4A); Lewis Smith & Øvstedal (1994: 210); Hansen (1995: 60); Jahns et al. (1995a: 248, figs 3–6; 249, figs 8, 9; 250, figs 10–12; 251, figs 13,14); Dobson (2000: 361); Brodo et al. (2001: 656, pl. 802); Øvstedal & Lewis Smith (2001: pl. 79).

Solorina spongiosa is characterised by: the terricolous/saxicolous habit; the shallowly concave to deeply urceolate apothecia, surrounded by a thin collar of green algal-containing tissue; and the characteristic coralloid or squamiform external cephalodia (grey-blue to brown-black or ±fulvescent, becoming dark and sponge-like when moist) forming a cushion around the apothecia.