Toninia bullata
Synonyms
Lecidea bullata
Family
Ramalinaceae
Flora category
Lichen – Native
Structural class
Lichens - Squamulose
Current conservation status
2018 | Not Threatened | Qualifiers: SO
Brief description
Characterised by the terricolous habit (acid soils); bullate to columnar, brown to reddish brown, dull to glossy, simple to branched squamules, often swollen at apices and with punctiform pseudocyphellae developing into pores; marginate, epruinose, black apothecia developing at tips of squamules; a blue-green (K−, N+violet) epithecium; a colourless to pale-brown hypothecium; and acicular, 3–7-septate ascospores, 37–55.5 × 3–4 μm.
Distribution
North Island: Gisborne (Mt Hikurangi). South Island: Nelson (Mt Arthur), Canterbury (Cass) to Fiordland. Stewart Island.
Known also from SE Australia, Tasmania, South Africa, Argentina, Chile (including Juan Fernandez), Ecuador, Venezuela, Mexico and the USA (Colorado).
Habitat
Alpine or subalpine, on both sides of the Main Divide; especially common on damp, schist faces on the Central Otago Mountains. On soil or among bryophytes in drainage cracks in rock, often associated with Coccocarpia palmicola, Massalongia carnosa, Pannaria hookeri, Parmelia signifera and Siphula decumbens.
Detailed description
Thallus greyish-white to pale greenish-grey in shaded situations, matt or shining, smooth to ± granular or uneven, spreading, 5-8(-10) cm diam., ± orbicular, margins well-defined to ± indistinct, usually corticolous, rarely saxicolous. Apothecia sessile, frequent centrally, often crowded, lecanorine (algae in excipulum small and easily overlooked), margins thick, entire, inflexed when young, becoming crenulate with age, disc plane, to 2.5 mm diam., orange-yellow, granular-pruinose. Ascospores colourless 85-125 × 30-45(-50) µm.
Substrate
Terricolous (ground)
Etymology
bullata: Blistered
Attribution
Fact sheet prepared by Melissa Hutchison (2 February 2022). Brief description, Distribution, Habitat, and Features sections copied from Galloway (1985, 2007).
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.