TYPE. UNITED STATES. Washington, [Grays Harbor County], Westport, on trees in sand, 1919, J.M. Grant (FH).
Description.Life form: lichenized fungus.
[Translated and modified from Motyka (1936-1938)] Thallus fruticose, ~8 cm high and wide, extremely hard and cartilaginous, pale yellowish green (usnic yellow), in herbarium pale brownish; base not darkened, slightly attenuated, rigid, usually immediately branched above; branching irregular, again sparingly branched; axils raised and branches commonly diverging. Branches irregularly curved, relatively strong; primary branches ~2.5 mm; secondary branches ~1.5 mm thick, almost dactyliform along the entire length, almost always distinctly attenuated at the base and there, as well as in the whole thallus, although rarely broken at the joint, at fractures +/- constricted, with a narrow fissure, quite irregular, completely smooth, often slightly deformed, subfoveolate or subtuberculate, completely papillose, and only the upper part of the branchlets commonly marked by soralia. Soralia broad, rounded, at level with thallus, whitish, and appearing granular; soredia apparently farinose. Thallus stratified: cortex extremely hard and chondroid, almost vitreous, pale brown, ~100 µm thick; medulla white, hyphae loose, ~250 µm thick; axis solid, ~450 µm in diam. Ascomata not known.
Chemistry. Medulla K-; otherwise not reported.
Substrate and habitat. Corticolous on branches.
Distribution. Primarily northwestern North America; in North Carolina represented by a single specimen in high elevation forests in the Blue Ridge ecoregion (Perry & Moore 1969).
Literature
Motyka, J. (1936-1938) Lichenum generis Usnea studium monographicum, pars systematica 1-2: 1-651 (original description).
Perry, J.D. & B.J. Moore (1969) Preliminary check list of foliose and fruticose lichens in Buncombe County, North Carolina. Castanea34: 146-157.