Beilschmiedia tawa (A.Cunn.) Hook.f. & Benth.

Auckland. Moumoukai Valley, Hunua Range, July 1949, Joan Dingley. Dacrydium cupressinum Sol. Wellington. Weraroa, Sept. 1919, G.H.C.; Same Locality, May 1923, J.C.Neill; Wilton's Bush, G.B.Rawlings. Hedycarya arborea Forst. Auckland. Oratia Stream, 500 feet, March 1931, M.Hodgkins. Leptospermum ericoides A.Rich. Auckland. Hunua Falls, 400 feet, Oct. 1946, G.H.C.

New Zealand.

Growing usually caespitose on bark or decorticated wood on the under surface of fallen branches and logs.

Pilei grow pendulous upon the under side of fallen logs, attached by a brief extension of the vertex. When solitary they assume a discoid shape with the hymenium downward; when caespitose, the common condition, the pilei merge to form large dish-shaped bodies attached by numerous short apical extensions. Occasionally plants assume a flabelliform shape, and are then attached by. a lateral extension of the pileus. Such forms resemble pilei of P. exiguis from which they may be separated by the minute pores, prominently toothed dissepiments, lighter colour of the hymenophore, and globose spores. Dissepiments are very thin and delicate. In old specimens the hymenium may become much creviced and torn, when it is difficult to detect the pores.

In Fries' herbarium at Upsala I saw specimens named P. catervatus by M.C.Cooke. They had been collected in July 1874, at Wellington by S.Berggren and are identical with specimens described above and the illustration given by Berkeley (l.c., Pl. CV., Fig. 1.)

TYPE LOCALITY: Waimate, Bay of Islands, New Zealand.