PDD 48207, 48213, 48506.

Fruiting body a stalked sporangium, gregarious, often occurring in extensive fruitings, 1–5 mm tall. Sporotheca globose, usually nodding, deep reddish brown or brownish purple, varying to bright purple or rufous, 0.4–0.7 mm in diameter. Stalk long, slender, striate, often twisted near the apex, dark brown to black below, one to eight times as long as the diameter of the sporotheca. Peridial net consisting of a system of rigid, longitudinal ribs connected by delicate transverse filaments, usually umbilicate above. Calyculus absent; dictydine granules yellow or light orange yellow to deep brown, densely aggregated on the ribs of the peridial net, 1–2 um in diameter. Spores brick red or reddish purple-brown in mass, nearly colourless by transmitted light, nearly smooth to minutely warted, 4–7 µm in diameter. Plasmodium purple-black.

Cosmopolitan (Martin & Alexopoulos 1969) . First reported (as Dictydium umbilicatum) from New Zealand by Lister & Lister (1905), based on a specimen collected in Taranaki. Also known from Auckland, Buller, Dunedin, Southland (Rawson 1937), and Stewart Island.

Decaying wood, particularly that of conifers.

In most earlier treatments of the myxomycetes, this species is placed in a separate genus (Dictydium) on the basis of the prominent longitudinal ribs of the peridial net and the lack of a calyculus. Nannenga-Bremekamp (1964) pointed out that neither feature is absolutely different for the two genera and combined Dictydium and Cribraria.