Flora of New Zealand Series

Type : Pachyphiale corticola Lönnr.

Descriptions : Flora (1985: 328). See also Rose & James (1992: 417).

Pachyphiale is a temperate genus of six species (Kirk et al. 2001), included in the family Gyalectaceae (Eriksson et al. 2004; Pennycook & Galloway 2004; Eriksson 2005). The genus is characterised by a crustose, epiphloeodal thallus; Trentepohlia as photobiont; lecideine ascomata; a hamathecium of unbranched paraphyses with swollen apices; elliptical asci that are (8–)16–48-spored, not or only slightly thickened at the apex and without any internal apical apparatus; and colourless, acicular to spindle-shaped or fusiform, transversely 3–15-septate ascospores, lying parallel to one another or spirally arranged in the ascus. Himalayan taxa are discussed in Vězda & Poelt (1974), and species from the Iberian Peninsula by Alvarez Andrés (2003). One species is known from New Zealand, recorded in earlier accounts as Lecidea carneola (Hooker 1867: 581), Secoliga carneola (Müller Argoviensis 1894: 72), or Gyalecta carneola (Hellbom 1986: 71), these names based on a single North I. collection made by William Colenso.