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 Lepidoderma crustaceum
BiostatusPresent in region - Indigenous. Non endemic
Article: Stephenson, S.L. (2003). Myxomycetes of New Zealand. Fungi of New Zealand. Ngā Harore o Aotearoa 3: xiv + 238 p. Hong Kong: Fungal Diversity Press.
Description: Fruiting body a sessile (or less commonly stalked) sporangium (or rarely somewhat plasmodiocarpous), densely to loosely clustered, globose to subglobose, 1.0–1.5 mm in diameter. Stalk, when present, short, weak, translucent, appearing to represent an extension of the hypothallus. Hypothallus well developed, horny and opaque or thin, membranous, contiguous for a group of sporangia. Columella absent but a calcareous, typically conical, buff or pale cinnamon-brown pseudocolumella often present. Capillitium scanty, consisting of sparsely branched and anastomosing dark purple-brown threads, these paler and more slender toward the tips and bearing dark, spherical or fusiform expansions. Spores dark purple-brown in mass, purple-brown by transmitted light, prominently and densely spiny, occasionally tending to be agglutinated and discharged from the open sporangium in a mass, 11–13 µm in diameter. Plasmodium unknown.
Habitat: Living plants (including bryophytes), litter, and other types of plant debris, usually near the edges of melting snowbanks in alpine regions.
Distribution: Described originally from western North America (Kowalski 1967) and also known from Europe (Schnittler 1999). First reported from New Zealand by Stephenson & Johnston (2003), based on specimens collected in Central Otago.
Notes: This is the only species of Lepidoderma known from New Zealand in which the fruiting body is a sporangium. Moreover, the pale violaceous brown to buff colour of the outer peridium is distinctive.
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