Arthothelium ampliatum
≡Arthonia ampliata C.Knight & Mitt., Trans. Linn. Soc. 23: 106 (1860).
=Arthonia excedens sensu Lindsay, Trans. Linn. Soc. 25: 553 (1866) non Nyl.
Arthonia ampliata. Lectotype: New Zealand. ? Auckland, 1858, Charles Knight 276 – BM [fide Galloway (1985a: 18)].
Description : Flora (1985: 18).
N: Auckland. S: Otago (Fairfield, Saddle Hill). On decorticated wood of farm railings and fences, and on trees, often with Thelotrema lepadinum. Reported also from Papua New Guinea (Szatala 1956: 25; Aptroot et al. 1995: 25), Australia and Tasmania (Kantvilas 1990c; McCarthy 2003c).
? Palaeotropical
Illustrations : Knight & Mitten (1860: tab. 12, fig. 33 – as Arthonia ampliata); Lindsay (1866b: pl. LXIII, fig. 28 – as Arthonia excedens); Nylander (1888: tab. 1, fig. 6 – as Arthonia ampliata); Kantvilas (1990c: 21, fig. 1D)
Arthothelium ampliatum is characterised by: the lignicolous/corticolous habit; a thin, smooth to cracked, greenish grey thallus with a thin, black, marginal prothallus; black to brown-black, adnate, roundish to elongate apothecia; a brown epithecium (K+ olive-grey); a pale olive-green hymenium (K− ); clavate to oblong-ellipsoidal, somewhat curved ascospores, the terminal cell undivided and markedly enlarged, and with a muriform tail, 30–37 × 10–14 μm.
