Lobarina scrobiculata
Common name
Textured lung lichen
Synonyms
Lichen scrobiculatus Scop., Lobaria scrobiculata (Scop.) DC.
Family
Peltigeraceae
Flora category
Lichen – Native
Endemic taxon
No
Endemic genus
No
Endemic family
No
Structural class
Lichens - Foliose
Current conservation status
2018 | Not Threatened | Qualifiers: SO
Brief description
Characterised by the corticolous thallus; the scrobiculate thallus (blue-green when wet, pale yellowish or yellow-green to buff when dry), the numerous soralia on the upper surface and at the margins, the acicular, 3-septate ascospores, and the presence of scrobiculin in the medulla.
Distribution
North Island: Auckland (Rangitoto Island), South Auckland (Mangaotaki Valley King Country, Waiotapu Valley), Wellington (Tiritea Stream Palmerston North, Tararua Ranges). South Island: Nelson (Lake Rotoiti), Marlborough (Wairau Valley), Canterbury (Hanmer, Peel Forest), Otago (Makarora, Hindon, Lamb Hill, Waikouaiti Reservoir, Mt Trotter, Horse Range, Boyd’s Bush Dunedin, Beaumont, Tautuku Bay) to Southland (Forest Hill).
Known elsewhere from boreal regions of the Northern Hemisphere, where it is circumpolar, and from Australia.
Habitat
Mainly in lowland to subalpine sites of high humidity. Lobarina scrobiculata is moderately photophilous and will not tolerate deep shade. It is most commonly found in rather open, dryish situations very often associated with the shrubs Kunzea and Leptospermum scoparium agg. when these are dominant components of the vegetation in successional habitats. It is moderately common on rocks and is also an epiphyte of Dacrycarpus dacrydiodes, Griselinia littoralis, Metrosideros excelsa, Lophozonia menziesii and Phyllocladus alpinus.
It commonly associates with species of Coccocarpia, Degelia, Erioderma, Fuscoderma, Hypotrachyna, Leioderma, Nephroma, Normandina, Pannaria, Notoparmelia, Parmeliella, Physma, Heterodermia, Pseudocyphellaria, Psoroma, Sticta and Usnea.
Detailed description
Thallus foliose, lobate, spreading, loosely attached, to 16 cm diam., corticolous, occasionally saxicolous or terricolous. Lobes rounded, overlapping or sometimes broadly laciniate, margins entire or slightly crenulate, often sorediate, subascendent, ± thickened in sorediate parts. Upper surface undulate, scrobiculate-reticulate but without strongly defined interconnecting ridges, matt or shining, dark bluish-green or greyish-blue when wet, pale yellowish-green or olive-buff when dry, suffused brownish at margins and there markedly scabrid-areolate, without isidia, phyllidia, maculae or pseudocyphellae. Soredia laminal and marginal, in spreading, erose soralia, punctiform on lamina at first, then eroding, ± linear at margins, whitish or greyish, becoming bluish with age, coarse, granular. Medulla white. Lower surface white, delicately scabrid at margins, uneven or ± wrinkled-bullate, not distinctly veined but with naked, whitish, scabrid patches scattered among pale tan to dark brown tomentum which extends to the margins, tomentum silky, entangled. Apothecia and pycnidia not seen.
Chemistry: Cortex K−: Medulla K+ orange-red, C+ rose or −, Pd+ orange; containing constictic, norstictic, stictic and usnic acids, meta–scrobiculin and para–scrobiculin .
Substrate
Corticolous, occasionally saxicolous or terricolous
Attribution
Galloway D.J. 1985: Flora of New Zealand: Lichens. Wellington: PD Hasselberg, Government Printer. 662 pp.
Galloway D.J. 2007: Flora of New Zealand: Lichens, including lichen-forming and lichenicolous fungi. 2nd edition. Lincoln, Manaaki Whenua Press. 2261 pp.
References and further reading
Galloway D.J. 1985: Flora of New Zealand: Lichens. Wellington: PD Hasselberg, Government Printer. 662 pp.
Galloway D.J. 2007: Flora of New Zealand: Lichens, including lichen-forming and lichenicolous fungi. 2nd edition. Lincoln, Manaaki Whenua Press. 2261 pp.