This species is represented by a very peculiar phase. The adherent spores are in all respects normal, but the fructification as a whole is erionemoid! The sporangia are small, distributed as bead-like enlargements of the flaccid and thread-like, far extended stipe. When blown out, as the material before us is, the resemblance is to Erionema. This may be an unusual presentation; if not, it deserves recognition as varietal at least; B. capsulifera Berk. form-monilifera.

None in PDD.

Fruiting body a sessile sporangium (occasionally with a weak, strand-like stalk) or somewhat plasmodiocarpous, clustered to gregarious or in small colonies, globose or obovoid, greyish white or greenish white from spores within or pure white when empty, 0.5–1.5 mm in diameter. Hypothallus usually prominent, consisting of one or more white to brown membranes that are contiguous for a group of sporangia. Peridium consisting of a single layer, thin, translucent, covered with a limy network. Stalk, when present, membranous, weak, yellow or straw coloured. Capillitium consisting of a rather open network of thin, calcareous tubules, scarcely expanded at the nodes, white. Spores black in mass, purplish brown by transmitted light, adhering in firm clusters of mostly 6–20, broadly ovate, warted or bluntly spiny on the exposed surface and elsewhere smooth or nearly so, 11–14 µm in diameter. Plasmodium chrome yellow.

Bark of dead branches, sometimes while still attached to a living tree

Martin & Alexopoulos (1969), Nannenga-Bremekamp (1991), Neubert et al. (1995), Ing (1999).

This species can be recognized on the basis of the clustered spores and the thin, iridescent peridium.