Cladonia's ...

[JennyS]

Decided it might be best to give these a thread of their own - I did quite well at avoiding noticing Cladonia's for nearly a fortnight, but they got me again

These were all on or near stones and rocks in an upland field with damp, peaty soil.
The photographs showing the K and C reactions on specimens were taken the following day which is why there is some discrepancy in thallus colour.

Q1. Cladonia gracilis?




Q2. Very, very small, K-




Q3. K-. Cladonia squamosa?




Q4. K+




Q5. Cladonia strepsilis from C+ reaction and habitat, but this has black rhizines which Dobson doesn't mention .....




Q6. K+.



there's a lot to be said for going back to trying to avoid noticing them ....... must be 15-20+ different cladonia's on the rocks, heath and fields here!

[AlanS]

Ooh, 20+ Cladonias. Sad guy that I am, that sounds almost as enticing as your Teloschistes! (Almost!)

I have been busy adding Cladonia spp. to my website (a few more still in hand) and I have outline plans to go hunting for more of our northern ones next week. My favourite lichen genus.

Anyhow:

1. Yes.

2. Oh wow! I can only suggest this is C. incrassata, which would seem to be a very rare species in Ireland (on current recording), but it is one I have never seen. The picture in Dobson is, frankly, not one of his best, but it's in Brodo's Lichens of North America and looks a probable match. It looks like the apothecia are sessile on the basal squamules, which is correct.
As you are going to the Burren meeting*, perhaps you could take some along and get it checked out? If it can be authenticated, then apart from it being a good Irish record, it would be a valuable addition to your website.

(*More gnashing of teeth. I would have tried going to the Burren meeting, but we have our own university ecology field course the same week.)

3. Yes.

4. I am reasonably sure it is C. furcata, but it is horribly variable and not always easily separable from other species in its group. C. crispata can look very similar, but produces inconspicuous, perforate cups, which I do not see in your photograph.
C. furcata will probably be the next species up on my site, but this may have to wait for a few days.

5. Impressive "C" reaction, but as you rightly say, there are black rhizines (or marginal cilia), which no Cladonia should have. These are actual thallus lobes I am sure, not basal squamules, so not a Cladonia.
BUT - could there be more than one thing here? Perhaps the bit that has given the C reaction really IS C. strepsilis? I cannot tell.

6. This has me baffled, but, to continue previous comments, it looks like it is wet. If the right-hand photograph is all one thing, maybe it is sorediate, even though it seems not to be in the main photograph. If so, the K+ reaction is still a puzzle, but at least one of the segregates of the C. chlorophaea group is K+ and some of this group show this extensive proliferation of smaller stalked cups from the margins of the primary cups.
Whatever it is, it is interesting.
If it is C. chlorophaea group, then I have a name in mind, but I need to check some American papers on the group, not all of which I have yet. I may come back to this.
If it is NOT sorediate, then the K+ reaction is even more of a puzzle (to me at least).
[Note added in edit: thoughts on 6 continued below]

Alan

[AlanS]

Still thinking about number 6 and remembered I have some new information.

The C. chlorophaea segregate I was thinking of, C. cryptochlorophaea, does NOT check out. Anyhow, even if wet, I cannot see this as one of the C. chlorophaea group.

I keep coming back to it being a variant of C. gracilis, which was my first thought until I realised that the K+ reaction rules it out. C. gracilis can show this proliferation from the cup margins.

However, I see that there is a subspecies of C. gracilis that is K+, the problem being, it is not supposed to be British/Irish. Something else to get checked properly?

Maybe I am overlooking something mundane here, but I don't think so.

Going to bed, will think more in due course.

Alan

[JennyS]

Hi Alan,
Thanks for the confirmation on 1

2. That was my only possibility too!
With something this tiny is the apparent rarity partly/largely down to just being too small to get noticed? The only reason I spotted it was because of peering closer at the C. squamosa it was nestled among and seeing the odd-shaped apothecia.
Very sorry you won't be able to get to the Burren - can you hijack a helicopter for a quick day visit?!

3. I'd also IDed the one below as C. squamosa, but prior to starting to use reagents ..... is this just an example of how variable Cladonia's are or did I get the ID wrong?




4. Thank you for probable confirmation, and again I'm wondering about my (pre-reagent use) Cladonia furcata ID on the first one below. The second one below looks totally different, but I'd tentatively IDed it as probably C. furcata as well






5. It did appear to be all one cladonia species but next I'll test bits with and without cilia individually to see if that gives different results.....
Dobson says for C. foliacea "Rarely with black cilia on the margin" but habitat and underside colour, quite apart from that C+ seem to knock that one out anyway

6. I've got a very dry specimen sat next to me which does appear to be very slightly sorediate, at least in the cups but I've nothing with sufficient magnification to check it properly with......

I could send you some specimens if you would be interested?

[AlanS]

Hi again Jenny,

I keep mentioning books and this is not any effort to show off, honest, but I do have the 10 volumes of Natural History of Danish Lichens by Olaf Galløe, and volume 9 is devoted completely to Cladonia. It's not really an identification book - instead it is devoted to exhaustive descriptions of development, with numerous analytical monochrome plates and also a good number of colour plates showing the extensive range of variation in each species he covers (by no means all of them). As this thread is really testing the limits of my own experience, I have just been going through it.

He has a number of colour illustrations of C. incrassata, showing the 'bunches of grapes' apothecia very well, and your photograph is a perfect match. I'd say that, beyond reasonable doubt, you have a very good Irish find. (It would be pretty good even here in Great Britain of course.) That's my jealousy ratched up another notch. I think it is genuinely rare here, but you may well be right that it's overlooked in Ireland.

I am still baffled by your number 6. I don't think "Cladonia hibernica" has been invented yet ....

You are right and I am wrong about rhizoids on the margins of Cladonia squamules. Galløe specifically describes and illustrates these (and they are, indeed, secondary rhizoids) and how they develop in C. foliacea (under the synonym C. alcicornis). He states firmly that they don't occur in C. strepsilis. Your photographs are a good match to his illustrations of C. foliacea and he describes the underside as "yellowish white". I haven't seen C. foliacea recently, but I could accept your photographs as being that.
That leaves your 'C' reaction. Is there anything else in your bleach?
C. foliacea is yellow with KplusC, even though not with C alone, and maybe your bleach has an additive that is giving this reaction? It is a problem with bleaches now, and the manufacturers don't have to say what is in them.


On to the new photographs:

3 addendum: yes, still good C. squamosa.

4 addendum: I think the first is indeed C. furcata. I don't like its tendency for the branches to bunch at the tips, but Galløe illustrates such a form. No sign of 'crispata' cups.

The second photograph clearly shows perforate cups, with the podetium continuing to grow from one side of the cup, so this is C. crispata in one of its more recognisable states. Quite different from the picture in Dobson of course, but that is C. crispata for you. Good match to illustrations in Brodo and Galløe.

Send me specimens? Aaaagh! (Pauses to think of the current Euphrasia pile and shudders.)

Enjoy the Burren (difficult not to!).

Alan

[JennyS]

Hi Alan - thank you very much for all your time and help with these - Volume 9 sounds like a very, very useful inclusion in a Cladonia-ID survival kit......

Delighted that it confirms the possible C. incrassata, but Q6 might have to come to the Burren with me! (Hmmm, Cladonia hibernica ..... )

I've been a bit suspicious of a few of my C+ reactions - I bought a thin cheap bleach (Parazone) but the ingredients are just given as 'disinfectant' which is no help.
Acidic upland peat doesn't fit the habitat details I can find for C. foliacea but there doesn't seem to be any other possibilities with those rhizoids.......

The second photograph clearly shows perforate cups, with the podetium continuing to grow from one side of the cup, so this is C. crispata in one of its more recognisable states. Quite different from the picture in Dobson of course, but that is C. crispata for you. Good match to illustrations in Brodo and Galløe.

Yes, it was Dobson's C. crispata photo that threw me .... am I right with the one below (pre-chems) as also C. crispata?



Its going to take a long, long time to get a sense of the range of variation they've got, but it was a cladonia in my garden that first got me into this and their shapes are wonderful - total science fantasy!

[AlanS]

Originally Posted by JennyS;456396

Yes, it was Dobson's [I

C. crispata[/i] photo that threw me .... am I right with the one below (pre-chems) as also C. crispata?

That would be my best guess, but as is already clear, I am still learning these myself.

Alan

[JennyS]

Thanks Alan - you're at one end of the learning scale and I'm at the other!

[CapAndBracket]

Really at the low end of the learning scale, never the less today my eye
was caught by a clump of this about a foot up a betula trunk.



could it be Cladonia coniocraea.

Cheers J.P.

[AlanS]

Hi JP

Cladonia coniocraea looks a very good suggestion, but there are two or three others I cannot rule out. It would have been useful to have seen the detail of the tips of the spikes (podetia). Some of the red-fruited species can look very similar at this stage, but usually have minute red pycnidia.

Also, the material is very saturated and a much brighter green than it would be under normal conditions, which means that the usual colour clues do not help.

The podetia are covered with powdery granules (soredia), which cuts down the possibilities, but as well as C. coniocraea, it would be possible for this to be one of: C. polydactyla, C. macilenta (both drying very grey), or the rarer C. umbricola, or maybe others I have not thought of.

So sorry I cannot be 100% positive on this. C. coniocraea is most likely, but it is all too easy to be caught out.

Alan