Flora of New Zealand Series

≡Verrucaria fissa Taylor in J.T. Mackay, Fl. hibern. 2: 95 (1836).

Description : Flora (1985: 538–539).

N: sine loco (W. Colenso). S: Otago (Dunstan Mts, Old Man Ra.). On inundated rocks in alpine streams (Johnson & McCarthy 1997). Known also from cool-temperate to arctic-alpine regions of the Northern Hemisphere, and in Tasmania (Brodo 1981; Purvis et al. 1992; Nimis 1993; Santesson 1993; Esslinger & Egan 1995; McCarthy 2001g: 173; 2003c; 2006; Brodo et al 2001; Llimona & Hladun 2001; Nimis & Martellos 2003; Santesson et al. 2004).

Cosmopolitan

Illustrations : Zschacke (1934: 513, fig. 279); Brodo (1981: 60, fig. 26); Foucard (1990: fig. 317); Thomson (1991: 358, fig. 9); Dobson (2000: 365; 2005: 412); Brodo et al. (2001: 663, pl. 810).

Staurothele fissa is characterised by: the saxicolous (aquatic rocks) habit; the dark-brown, smooth, rimose-areolate thallus with buried perithecia forming conspicuous, prominent verrucae; 2-spored asci; dark-brown, ovoid to broadly ellipsoidal ascospores, (25–)30–50 × 15–25 μm.