DWM 5500

Fruiting body a stalked sporangium, solitary or occurring in small groups, 0.2–0.6 mm tall. Sporotheca spherical, dark brown to almost black, 0.2–0.3 mm in diameter. Stalk up to twice as long as the diameter of the sporotheca, hollow with intertwined fibres at the base, that become parallel above and there usually opaque and black. Hypothallus a colourless or pale yellow disk. Peridium fugacious, leaving a collar around the stalk. Columella dividing at the center of the sporotheca into a small number of main capillitial branches. Capillitium sparse, sturdy, branched 1–3 times and often forming a rather rigid, very fragmentary net on the surface of the sporotheca, with many free ends. Spores dark brown in mass, lilac-grey in transmitted light, 12–13 µm in diameter, covered with spines about 1 µm long. Plasmodium colourless.

Widespread in Europe (Lado 1999) and also known from North America (Kowalski 1987). Not reported in print as occurring in New Zealand but appearing in a moist chamber culture prepared with bark samples from Nothofagus fusca. The samples were collected in Marlborough.

Bark of living trees.

Nannenga-Bremekamp (1991), Ing (1999).

This species and Paradiacheopsis acanthodes are rather similar morphologically, but the latter has a lax and much less extensive capillitium.