LICHALP

Candelariella efflorescens R.C. Harris & W.R. Buck

Lichenised. Poorly known taxon.

Substrate: bark

Altitudinal range: from the submediterranean/colline belt (potential vegetation: mixed deciduous forests dominated by Quercus and Carpinus) to the subalpine belt (potential vegetation: open, taiga-like forests dominated by Larix decidua and/or Pinus cembra and Rhododendron)

Note: a species with a finely granulose-sorediate thallus; European material is mostly sterile, and only fertile specimens (with 32-spored asci) can be assigned with certainty to this species; for similar specimens with 8-spored asci C. xanthostigmoides (Müll. Arg.) R.W. Rogers might be the correct name (see below); the species is also hard to distinguish from some morphs of C. reflexa; usually on eutrophicated bark of broad-leaved trees, widespread and common in the Alps at low elevations.