FILICALES. Blechnum capense: Auckland, Te Araroa, 200 m. Blechnum filiforme: Wellington, Lake Papaitonga, 20 m. Cyathea dealbata: Auckland; Kauaeranga Valley, Thames, 60 m; Huia, 70 m. Wellington, Lake Papaitonga, 20 m. Cyathea medullaris: Auckland, Te Araroa, 200 m; Lake Okataina, 400 m; Lake Rotoehu, 400 m; Earthquake Flat, Rotorua, 500 m; Mamaku Forest, 600 m. Wellington, Bruces Reserve, Hunterville, 120 m; Totara Reserve, Pohangina Valley, 70 m; Ballance Reserve, 30 m; Lake Papaitonga, 20 m. Cyathea smithii: Wellington, Blyth Track, Ohakune, 700 m; Totara Reserve, Pohangina Valley, 75 m. Westland, Weheka, 200 m. Otago, Horseshoe Bay, Stewart Island. Dicksonia squarrosa: Auckland, Coromandel Peninsula, 300 m. Wellington, Totara Reserve, Pohangina Valley, 75 m. Pteridium esculentum: Auckland, Earthquake Flat, Rotorua, 500 m.

Hymenophore annual, membranous, adherent, forming orbicular or linear maculiform areas 2-15 mm across, sometimes merging to form linear areas to 12 cm long; hymenial surface white, velutinate, minutely areolately creviced; margin thinning out, concolorous, arachnoid, adherent. Context white, 10-30 µm thick, basal layer of a few repent hyphae firmly cemented, intermediate layer of mainly erect hyphae more freely branched in the subhymenium, pseudoparenchymatous when old; generative hyphae 2.5-3 µm diameter, walls 0.2 µm thick, with clamp connections. Fascicles arising from the basal layer and projecting for the greater part of their length, 8-10 per mm, cylindrical with penicillate apices, 90-130 x 12-25 µm, composed of 20-45 thin-walled sparsely septate hyphae closely arranged, sometimes branched near apices. Hymenial layer to 30 µm deep, a close palisade of basidia and paraphyses interrupted by the fascicles. Basidia subclavate, 12-18 x 5-6 µm, bearing 2-4 spores; sterigmata arcuate, slender, to 6 µm long. Paraphyses subclavate, 8-14 x 4-5 µm. Spores suballantoid with bluntly acuminate bases, or pip-shaped, 7-9 x 3-3.5 µm, walls smooth, hyaline, 0.2 µm thick; often adhering in pairs or fours.

DISTRIBUTION: France, New Zealand.

HABITAT: Effused on dead stipes of tree ferns and bracken and rhizomes of climbing ferns.

Fascicles are delicate, readily fractured, cylindrical with penicillate apices, and composed of compact, thin-walled generative hyphae sometimes sparsely branched near their apices. Spores are suballantoid with acuminate bases, or pip-shaped, and frequently adhere in pairs or fours. In actively growing specimens the context is composed of basal and intermediate layers; shortly tissues become compacted and pseudoparenchymatous, so that details of structure can be ascertained only from sections taken from near the growing periphery. Collections agree with a specimen examined in Kew herbarium, ex "Aveyron, France, herb. Bourdot, No. 8053". The species is confined to dead stipes of ferns both in France and New Zealand, in this region being associated with Corticium confusum, C. filicinum, C. pteridophilum, and Tubulicrinis vermicularis.

TYPE LOCALITY: Aveyron, France.