TYPE. PORTUGAL. Beira Litoral, Serra da Leousan, quinta de alfocheira, sur l’écorce de Eucalyptus, 250 m, VIII.1943, Tavares s.n. (UPS, holotype).

Description. Life form: lichenized fungus.

Thallus crustose, immersed to superficial, thin, whitish to grayish, up to 0.4 mm diam.; prothallus black, thin; vegetative diaspores absent. Photobiont chlorococcoid alga; cells rounded, 6-12 µm diam. Ascomata biatorine apothecia 0.2-0.5 mm diam., sessile to slightly adnate with constricted base, 0.2-0.9 mm diam.; disk pale to dark red-brown, flat to convex, pruinose; margin thin, persistent or reduced, same color as disk, epruinose. Exciple well-developed, inner hyaline, edge pale brownish, composed of strongly conglutinated, radiating, thick-walled cells; epithecium pale red-brown, K+ dull brown or dissolving, N–, 10-12 µm thick; hymenium hyaline, 45-100 µm high; subhymenium hyaline, 10-15 µm high; hypothecium hyaline, 20-60 µm tall, hyaline, I+ blue. Paraphyses branched below, occasionally anastomosed, apices slightly thickened with brown caps. Asci clavate, 8-spored, 55-65 × 15-20(-28) µm, ± Lecidella-type with wide apical cushion; ascospores simple to rarely 2-celled, 13-17(-19) × 8.5-10 µm, ellipsoid, thick walled, wall homogeneous. Pycnidia not seen.

Chemistry. Thallus UV–, K± faint yellow, KC–, C–, PD–, I–; atranorin.

Substrate and Habitat. Corticolous on acid bark of hardwood and coniferous trees in humid or oceanic habitats.

Distribution. Europe-Macaronesia with disjunct populations in southern South America and eastern North America; in North Carolina found in the Blue Ridge ecoregion.

Literature

James, P.W. (2009) Japewiella Printzen (1999) Pp. 449-450 in Smith, C.W., A. Aptroot, B.J. Coppins, A. Fletcher, O.L. Gilbert, P.W. James & P.A. Wolseley (eds.). The Lichens of Great Britain and Ireland. The British Lichen Society, London.

Rodriguez-Flakus, P. (2020) Non-saxicolous lecideoid lichens in southern South America. Phytotaxa 476(1): 1-73.