PDD 15946, 15950, 17607.

Fruiting body a sessile sporangium, scattered or crowded within small clusters, globose to irregularly pulvinate, shining olivaceous to bright yellow, 0.15–0.70 mm in diameter. Hypothallus ranging from contiguous for a group of sporangia to often inconspicuous, membranous, very thin, colourless to light brown. Peridium membranous, translucent, without granular deposits, usually embossed with the impressions of the spores, yellow or nearly colourless. Capillitium consisting of pale yellow to medium olivaceous yellow, simple or branched elaters, 3.0–4.5 µm in diameter, bearing 4 or 5 smooth, close, sometimes faint spiral bands, with tapering or blunt and bulbous tips. Spores bright yellow to medium olivaceous yellow in mass, pale yellow by transmitted light, 10–12 µm in diameter, densely and sometimes unevenly warted or spiny. Plasmodium watery pink.

This rarely collected species has been reported from widely scattered localities in the Northern Hemisphere (Martin & Alexopoulos 1969), and is apparently most common at high latitudes (Stephenson et al. 2000). First reported from New Zealand by Rawson (1937), based on a specimen collected in Dunedin. Also known from Nelson and Buller.

Decaying wood; also occurring on plant debris placed in moist chamber culture.

Martin & Alexopoulos (1969), Neubert et al. (1993), Lado & Pando (1997), Ing (1999).

The thin, delicate and translucent peridium, elaters with tightly wound and smooth spiral bands, and distinctly warted or spinulose spores distinguish Trichia lutescens from all other sessile species in the genus