CUNONIACEAE. Weinmannia racemosa: Taranaki, Mt. Egmont, 950 m; Dawson Falls, Mt. Egmont, 850 m. Wellington, Blyth Track, Ohakune, 400 m. ELAEOCARPACEAE. Aristotelia serrata: Auckland, Lake Waikaremoana, 450 m. FAGACEAE. Nothofagus menziesii: Otago, Alton Valley, Tuatapere, 150 m; Catlins, 100 m. MYRTACEAE. Leptospermum scoparium: Auckland, Waikowhai. PITTOSPORACEAE. Pittosporum tenuifolium: Auckland, Kauri Glen, Northcote, 120 m.

Hymenochaete insularis Berk., Grevillea I: 165, 1873.

Hymenophore resupinate, annual, membranous, adherent, at first appearing as scattered orbicular colonies 2-10 mm across, merging to form linear areas to 25 x 3 cm; hymenial surface cinnamon or umber, sometimes reddish-brown, colliculose, often rugulose, becoming deeply and finely areolately creviced; margin thinning out, concolorous or white, tan, bay, or ferruginous, fibrillose, adherent. Context ferruginous, 90-150 µm thick, of intertwined hyphae often compacted embedding the setae; generative hyphae 2.5-3 µm diameter, walls 0.5-1 µm thick, golden brown. Setal layer occupying the entire context, of several overlapping rows of setae; setae subulate, sometimes geniculated or distorted, some projecting to 35 µm, 45-75 x 10-18 µm, walls reddish-brown, apices verruculose, lumena usually wide and occasionally exhibiting false septa. Hymenial layer to 30 µm deep, a close palisade of basidia and paraphyses. Basidia subclavate, 12-16 x 3.5-4 µm, bearing 2-4 spores; sterigmata slightly arcuate, slender, to 4 µm long. Paraphyses subclavate, 6-12 x 3-3.5 µm. Spores allantoid, 3-4.5 x 1-1.5 µm, walls smooth, hyaline, 0.1 µm thick.

DISTRIBUTION: Europe, Great Britain, North America, New Zealand.

HABITAT: Bark of dead branches associated with a white rot.

Collections agree with authentic European specimens examined in Kew herbarium. The species may be recognised by the areolately creviced often rugulose surface and stout, often distorted or radicate setae with verruculose apices. Spores are allantoid and 3-4.5 x 1-1.5 µm, measurements which agree with European specimens, but are smaller than those published by Burt (1918b, p. 359) for North American material. The surface colour ranges from dusky cinnamon to umber or reddish-brown, and the surface may be colliculose, or when examined under a lens, finely rugulose and velutinate. Setae vary appreciably in shape and size, and of those embedded in tissues of the context some may be geniculated, inserted laterally, or strongly radicate. A few exhibit one or more false septa, accidental bridges across the wide lumena.

TYPE LOCALITY: Europe.