Clavulina copiosocystidiata R.H. Petersen 1988
Details
Biostatus
Nomenclature
Classification
Associations
Descriptions
Clavulina copiosocystidiata R.H. Petersen 1988
Fruit bodies up to 3.5 x 1 cm, sparingly but finely branched, gregarious to densely cespitose (and then perhaps abortive or remaining juvenile), whitish when young, slowly becoming mouse-grey to brownish-grey ("light drab", "drab", "hair-brown", "dusky") with ivory-coloured stipe and apices. Stipe 8 x 3 mm, irregular in cross section, inserted nakedly, but involving a small ball of substrate. Branches 2-3, flattened, occasionally palmate, twisted; axils rounded to acute. Apices cristate or irregularly acerose to irregularly lobed or gnarled, not dichotomous. Odour and taste negligible.
Tramal hyphae of branches hyaline, thin-walled, inflated up to 9 pm diam., clamped, free, generally parallel, often agglutinated in juxtaposition to subhymenium. Hymenium thickening; basidia 42-47 x 7 gm, clamped, subclavate to cylindrical, opalescent to multiguttulate when mature; sterigmata 2, curved-divergent; post-partal septation common but not invariable, the proximal portion remaining refringent under phase contrast. Cystidia (Fig. 48) plentiful, scattered, 50-85 x 10-12 gm, narrowly sphaero-pedunculate, emergent up to 40 gm, aseptate, the apical portion refringent under phase contrast, the more proximal part hyaline.
Spores (Fig. 49) 7.6-9.0 x 6.1-7.2 gm (E =1.11-1.25; E" =1.19; L'° = 8.02 gm), subglobose to broadly ellipsoid, thin-walled, opalescent when mature; hilar appendix small, papillate.
Macroscopically, fruit bodies are similar to small individuals of Clavulina leveillei, under which name they were gathered. Microscopically, however, spores and basidia are considerably smaller, cystidia are shorter, more broadly clavate, aseptate, refringentandmore plentiful. When dried, fruit bodies sometimes take on a somewhat cartilaginous appearance, indicative of the agglutinating substance present in some tissues also being present on the fruit body exterior.
At x60, the hymenium appears pruinose from the scattered cystidia, which are not in clusters as in Clavulina geoglossoides and other taxa. The branch apices appear sterile, but the hymenium is otherwise amphigenous.