Phyllocladus alpinus Hook. f. Wellington: Maungatorotoro Stream, Mt. Ruapehu, 3,000ft, March 1948, J.M. Dingley; Whakapapa, Mt. Ruapehu, 3,500ft, October 1954, J.M. Dingley. Phyllocladus trichomanoides Don. Auckland: Huia, 300ft, January 1955, E.E. Chamberlain. Wellington: Oturere River, Mt. Tongariro, 3,800ft, December 1946, G.H.C., type collection, P.D.D. herbarium, No. 4981.

Hymenophore resupinate, perennial, membranous, adnate, at first developing as numerous scattered orbicular or irregular colonies 2-5 mm diameter, merging to form irregular areas to 9 x 5 cm; hymenial surface at first bright cinnamon, or reddish-brown, when old ochraceous, ferruginous or cinereous, even or velutinate, tardily deeply and irregularly creviced, sometimes lifting at edges of crevices; margin thinning out, or abrupt and cliff-like, fibrillose or even, concolorous, loosely attached, sometimes lifting slightly. Context ferruginous or umber, 0.3-1 mm thick, with an intermediate tissue of loosely intertwined hyphae arising from numerous points of attachment and radiating upwards, in perennial specimens loosely intertwined below, compacted for the greater part into a palisade with numerous darker parallel bands formed from ends of pseudosetae; hyphal system dimitic; skeletal hyphae irregular in shape, tapering from apex to base, 3-5 µ diameter, lumen almost capillary, rarely branched or septate, walls reddish-brown; generative hyphae 2.5-3 µ diameter, walls 0.25 µ thick, hyaline, freely branched and septate, with prominant clamp connexions. Hymenial layer a close palisade of basidia, paraphyses and pseudosetae. Basidia subclavate, 35-40 x 8-10 µ, 2-4-spored; sterigmata erect, slender, to 10 µ long. Paraphyses subclavate, shorter and narrower than the basidia. Pseudosetae mostly submerged when slightly inflated apically, with walls brown and verruculose; many projecting to 3.5 µ, when to 8 µ diameter, with walls hyaline or coloured, 2-3 µ thick, usually delicately verruculose. Spores fusiform with bluntly acuminate ends, 12-20 x 5-7 µ, walls smooth, hyaline, 0.25 µ thick.

DISTRIBUTION: New Zealand.

HABITAT: Effused on bark of dead standing trunks.

Hymenophorum resupinatum, membranaceum, perenne, adnatum, effusum; superficies hymenii cinnamomea vel rubro-brunnea, fertili cinerea vel ochracea, alte inaequaliter rimosa. Contextus ferrugineus vel umbrinus, hyphis radiatim ordinatis, ubi stratosus hyphis erectis in vallo compactis; hypharum systema dimiticum; hyphae skeletales 3-5 µ diam., lumina paene capillaria, brunnea; hyphae generatoriae 2.5-3 µ diam., hyalinae, nodulosae. Pseudosetae 6-8 µ diam., parietibus brunneis vel hyalinis, ad 2 µ crassis, subtiliter apice verruculosae. Basidia subclavata, 35-40 x 8-10 µ, 2^-4 sporis in tenuibus sterigmatibus. Sporae fusiformes, 12-20 x 5-7 µ.

Fructifications are resupinate and somewhat loosely attached to bark of dead standing trees, seldom to decorticated wood of the same. The species may be identified by the resupinate fructifications often arranged in small scattered orbicular colonies, arrangement of the context hyphae, large basidia and large fusiform spores. Pseudosetae vary appreciably in form. They arise from apices of skeletal hyphae, most forming a close palisade beneath the hymenium, then being brown, slightly inflated and verruculose. Those which project above the hyphal surface to 35 µ, become thickened to 8 µ and with walls 2-3 µ thick; they may be brown or hyaline, verruculose or naked. In perennial specimens the greater part of the context is. formed from a loose palisade of hyphae arranged in several strata, each delimited by a horizontal coloured zone of apices of pseudosetae, some coated with fine crystals, others naked. Spores are abundant in all collections, fusiform, either with blulitly acuminate ends, or apices bluntly rounded, and may attain a length of 20 µ. Collections were taken from bark of standing dead trunks of two related species of Phyllocladus.