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CLADONIA FLOERKEANA

Cladonia floerkeana

Cladonia Family [Cladoniaceae]  

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20th April 2012, Duddon Mosses, Foxfield, Cumbria. Photo: © RWD
As scarlet red as phosphorus-based striking matches. Growing with Cladonia Portentosa (middle right).


20th April 2012, Duddon Mosses, Foxfield, Cumbria. Photo: © RWD
The redness is at the uppermost extremities of the lichen.


20th April 2012, Duddon Mosses, Foxfield, Cumbria. Photo: © RWD
Sometimes forming an un-even ring, sometimes an over-lapping encrustation.


20th April 2012, Duddon Mosses, Foxfield, Cumbria. Photo: © RWD
The lichen is match-stick like, and probably shorter than a match-stick, but is more of a grey-green colour than the grey of the Cladonia portentosa on the right.


20th April 2012, Duddon Mosses, Foxfield, Cumbria. Photo: © RWD
But beneath the covering of grey-green tiny flakes the lichen is brownish.


20th April 2012, Duddon Mosses, Foxfield, Cumbria. Photo: © RWD
Sometimes branched, often not.


20th April 2012, Duddon Mosses, Foxfield, Cumbria. Photo: © RWD
The red encrustations are smooth.


20th April 2012, Duddon Mosses, Foxfield, Cumbria. Photo: © RWD
The algal-containing coarse granules are squamules. [The similarly red-tipped (but a deeper shade of red, not a scarlet red as here) Cladonia macilenta has areas of powdery soredia instead and is green when wet, whereas Cladonia floerkeana is grey even when wet].


20th April 2012, Duddon Mosses, Foxfield, Cumbria. Photo: © RWD
Nearby surfaces are usually also covered in the squamules, being the means by which it proliferates.


Easily mis-identified as : Cladonia polydactyla and with Cladonia macilenta, both are red-tipped, but the red of C. floerkeana is more scarlet than the deeper red of Cladonia macilenta. Also Cladonia polydactyla is less often branched, usually thinner and longer and greyer than C. floerkeana. [The species list for Duddon Mosses lists only the above Cladonia floerkeana and Cladonia portentosa (= C. impexa), Cladonia pyxidata and Cladonia conioerea, so your Author is almost certain that the ID is spot on here].

Other Look-e-likees: Red Crest (Cladonia cristatella)


  Cladonia floerkeana  ⇐ Global Aspect ⇒ Cladoniaceae  

CLADONIA FLOERKEANA

Cladonia floerkeana

Cladonia Family [Cladoniaceae]