DWM 5527

Fruiting body a stalked sporangium, solitary to scattered, 0.20–0.35 mm tall. Sporotheca globose, brown, 0.10–0.12 mm in diameter. Stalk cylindrical but with an expanded base, hollow, upper portion black, somewhat paler below. Hypothallus discoid, inconspicuous. Peridium persistent, metallic and then somewhat irridescent to dark purplish brown, the basal portion persisting as a small collar. Columella dark, opaque, reaching to about one-half to two-thirds the height of the sporotheca, there giving rise to 2–4 primary branches. Capillitium moderately abundant, lax, consisting of purplish brown threads, these extending at more or less right angles to the columella when short and tending to arch downward toward the base of the sporotheca when long. Spores brown in mass, pale violaceous by transmitted light, distinctly and unevenly spiny, 7–8 µm in diameter. Plasmodium white.

Described originally from North America (Eliasson et al. 1988), this apparently uncommon species has been reported from too few localities for its worldwide distribution to be known completely. Not reported in print as occurring in New Zealand but appearing in moist chamber culture on bark samples from Nothofagus menziesii. The bark samples were collected in Southland. There are no previous records of Macbrideola declinata from the Southern Hemisphere.

Bark of living trees.

Eliasson et al. (1988).

Members of the genus Macbrideola belong to the special ecological group of myxomycetes associated with the bark surface of living trees and usually observed only in moist chamber cultures prepared with samples of bark. Most fruitings tend to consist of relatively few sporangia, and because these tend to be quite small, they are easily overlooked.