Hymenophore annual, firm and corky-woody, brittle, imbricate or solitary, attached by a narrow stem-like base which does not exceed 5 x 5 mm. Pileus fan-shaped or conchate, slightly concave, 2-5 cm. x 2-4 cm. x 1-2 mm.; surface at first orange or orange-rufous, when concentrically zoned with dark brown bands near the base, becoming tobacco-brown or black, radiately striate, fluted or not, glabrous, cuticle present, 100-200 μ thick, appearing black and shining in section, composed of parallel chestnut-brown hyphae firmly cemented together with interstices filled with mucilage, poorly developed in young plants when represented by brown or black zones; margin bluntly rounded, plane, toothed, crenate; hymenial surface at first orange-rufous, becoming reddish-brown or dark brick-red, even, fertile to the margin, dissepiments not toothed. Context 0.2-0.5 mm. thick, to 1 mm. at the base, orange-rufous and shining, of densely packed parallel radiately arranged hyphae; generative hyphae 5-7 μ thick, wall 0.5 μ, chestnut-brown, branched, septate. Pores angular, 0.5-2 mm. deep, 100-250 μ diameter, or 3-4 per mm.; dissepiments 100-150 μ thick, equal, apices delicately velutinate. Basidia clavate, 10-12 x 4-5 μ, soon collapsing. Spores globose or subglobose, 4.5-6 μ, smooth, hyaline.

New Zealand.

Lloyd described the species from a rather fragmentary collection taken from the under side of a log lying in a grass pasture. In these specimens the cuticle was poorly developed so that he did not observe the striking contrast typical specimens display between the dark brick-red hymenium, orange-rufous context and black surface of the pileus. The typical black colour of the cuticle does not develop fully until plants are ageing, since it is derived from a change in colour of the mucilage in which hyphae are embedded. In several collections at hand it is represented only by dark areas which have formed beneath the black or brown zones of the surface. Plants with poorly developed cuticle may be separated from C. laeta by their smaller size, thinner context and smaller pores.

Lloyd (1922) described this species from material sent to him from New Zealand by Dr G. H. Cunningham. Gilmour (1966a) listed it as causing a white pocket heart rot of living trees. This wood-rotting fungus is endemic to New Zealand, occurring on over-mature trees in indigenous forests.