[AlanS]

I am happy to agree with the Cladonia identifications:

Cladonia coniocraea
C. uncialis ssp. biuncialis
C. portentosa.

My thanks to Jenny for links to my C. uncialis pages, but this thread has shown up a problem that will have to result in a note on my site.

I was astonished to see C. uncialis ssp. uncialis is recorded from Skye, which is only marginally more likely than a herd of giraffes in my back garden (and no, I don't live next to a zoo).
I have had a look at the NBN Gateway and my immediate fears are confirmed - loads of spurious records from all over Britain, for a taxon that is strongly continental in distribution and just reaching Britain in a very few localities - on periodically dry, sandy or gravelly soils in the north-east, reliably south to Northumberland (though like the very similarly distributed C. mitis it might possibly occur or have occured in the formerly rich lichen heaths at Dungeness).

The Skye records prove to be supposedly from Francis Rose's notebooks, which one might think were reliable, but the dates make it virtually impossible that Francis Rose would have recorded "C. uncialis ssp. uncialis". He will have recorded "C. uncialis" and someone else has 'interpreted' the record.

What we have here is the standard problem with nominate subspecies. Someone records "Cladonia x", no subspecies mentioned. Then some numpty who should never have been allowed anywhere near a database, sees that Cladonia x has two subspecies, x and y. And because this numpty has the IQ of a housebrick, he/she/it decides that as the record isn't stated to be "Cladonia x ssp. y", then it must be Cladonia x ssp. x. And so yet more garbage is added to the National Biodiversity Network, which has no error checking mechanism.

This is, as I say, a general problem with nominate subspecies, as much with plants as with lichens, and no doubt other groups, but, having looked at the sources, I can state quite catagorically that the NBN maps for:
Cladonia uncialis ssp. uncialis
Cladonia arbuscula ssp. arbuscula
Cladonia crispata var. crispata
are so seriously flawed that they should not be given any credence whatsoever.
Cladonia ciliata var. ciliata is also shown as massively over-recorded.

Any lichen record that does not come from the BLS Mapping Scheme (which cannot be accessed from the NBN Gateway without specific permission) or from the Scottish Sites Lichen Database, should be treated as suspect and, for critical taxa, will often be best ignored. I regret this includes data from JNCC surveys.

Sorry for the diatribe, but it annoys me so much that we get this stupidity even from statutory sources.

Incidentally, if time allows, I shall be adding various Cladonia subgenus Cladina species and subspecies to my site quite soon. Got to finish the chemical testing. (Still trying to find C. azorica though - I bet Jenny has it in her area).

Alan