Flora of New Zealand Series

Phyllocharis elegans Fée, Essai cryptog. Écorc. exot. Officin.: XCIV (1825).

Thallus subcuticular, effigurate, rounded to sometimes irregular, 2-5(-10) mm diam., margins with short, rounded lobes, 0.1-0.3 mm broad, or ± entire without distinct lobes, or lobes rather long with rounded ends, 0.2-0.4 mm broad, confluent in central parts, convex to plane, smooth, shining, bright green to greyish-green, sometimes with white, soft hairs at periphery, prothallus absent. Perithecia 0.25-0.4 mm diam., almost totally immersed in the thallus, or ± convex, their uppermost part exposed, black, shining, ostiole punctiform, grey or white. Asci ± obclavate 40-70(-90) × 8-12(-14) µm. Ascospores biseriate, 1-septate, fusiform 14-24 × 4.5-5 µm. Pycnidia common and sometimes numerous, punctiform, black, ± globose, immersed. Macroconidia 1-septate, bacillar (12-)14-18(-21) × 3-4 µm. Microconidia simple, ellipsoid to fusiform 4-5 × 2 µm.

N: Hawke's Bay (Turiroa). Wellington, (Feilding, Kitchener Park, Manawatu Gorge). On leaves of Alectryon excelsum and Beilschmiedia tawa; very common.

Pantropical

The most common of all foliicolous lichens, and probably much more widely distributed in northern New Zealand in tawa forest.