Flora of New Zealand Series

Thallus placodioid, orbicular and effigurate, closely to ± loosely attached, margins ± lobate. Upper surface matt to ± scabrid, often markedly rimose- fissured centrally. Medulla white, hyphae mainly in a fan-like arrangement. Photobiont blue-green, Nostoc and ? Rivularia, concentrated in the upper part of thallus. Lower surface dark, decorticate, ± rhizinate. Apothecia innate or emergent and then ± sessile, rounded, disc plane or subconcave, red-brown or brownish, thalline exciple rudimentary or rarely well-developed. Asci with amyloid cap or ring-structure, 8-spored. Paraphyses distinctly septate, branched to anastomosing. Ascospores simple to multiseptate, colourless. Pycnidia large, of two types, either locular or with a central hollow, and cerebriform. Conidiophores short-celled producing in both types rod-shaped conidia both terminally and laterally.

Steinera is a Southern Hemisphere genus of four species confined to the subantarctic islands (Kerguelen, Crozet, Auckland, Campbell and Macquarie) and extending into alpine and subalpine areas of southern New Zealand. Steinera is included in the Coccocarpiaceae because of the particular ontogeny of the apothecia in the four rather disparate species described. Three species are known from New Zealand. Steinera, (as well as Siphulastrum, Argopsis and Knightiella), is a Southern Hemisphere lichen genus of few species and restricted distribution and may represent a relic of a once more widespread southern lichen flora. It is monographed by Henssen and James [ Bull. Br. Mus. nat. Hist. (Bot.) 10: 227-256 (1982)].