Notulae to the Italian flora of algae, bryophtes, fungi and lichens: 15

In this contribution, new data concerning algae, bryophytes, fungi and lichens of the Italian flora are presented. It includes new records and confirmations for the algal genus Nitella , for the bryophyte genera Anthoceros , Dicranodontium , Fontinalis , and Riccia , the fungal genera Inocybe and Xerophorus , and the lichen genera Bagliettoa , Biatora , Calicium , Cladonia , Coniocarpon , Lecanora , Opegrapha

Anthoceros agrestis is quite similar to A. punctatus L., from which it can be distinguished essentially for the size of the mature antheridia, mostly about 80 μm long. It is mainly distributed in the temperate zone of central Europe but is rather rare in the Mediterranean-Atlantic parts (Hodgetts and Lockart 2020). In Italy, A. agrestis is signaled with old records for Piemonte, Toscana, Campania, and Sardegna, while more recent data (after 1968) are available for Lombardia (Brusa 2019), Lazio, Vatican City State, Calabria, and Sicilia (Aleffi et al. 2020). In the new locality it was found with Riccia sp. pl. and Tortula truncata (Hedw.) Mitt. This species is assessed as Near Threatened in Europe (Hodgetts et al. 2019).
F. Faltner, P. Mair Dicranodontium asperulum is a Boreal-montane species with main distribution in North America, SE Asia (China, Japan Nepal, India), and central Europe, while it is very rare in the Mediterranean countries (Hodgetts and Lockart 2020). In Italy it occurs only in Piemonte, Veneto, Umbria, and was recorded before 1968 in Lombardia and Trentino-Alto Adige (Aleffi et al. 2020). The species prefers sheltered moist sites where it grows on acidic soils in montane heath, on ledges or crevices among acidic rocks. It is easily recognized by the wide-spreading leaves, standing out from the stem at 45° or more when wet, the serrate to serrulate shoulders of the leaf bases and the long arista which is serrate all around. In the new locality, D. asperulum was found on acidic soil at the base of Fagus sylvatica L., together with Plagiotecium denticulatum ( Fontinalis hypnoides var. hypnoides is an aquatic moss growing submerged in standing or slow-moving water, including slightly eutrophic lakes, slow flowing rivers, or in reed-beds, normally attached to stones and wood. It is quite common in Europe (Hodgetts and Lockart 2020). According to Aleffi et al. (2020), F. hypnoides var. hypnoides is known in Italy from Veneto, Abruzzo, Puglia, Calabria and, with old records, Lombardia, Lazio and Sardegna. In Sardegna it was previously signalled more than a century ago from a few sites located in the eastern part of the island (Cardot 1882;Barbey 1884;Fleischer 1893). Fontinalis hypnoides var. hypnoides is distinguished from other species in the genus by its medium size and monomorphic leaves consistently plane at the apices.
S. Poponessi, A. Cogoni Riccia breidleri is endemic to Alps (Hodgetts et al. 2020), growing above 2000 m of elevations. This species grows on acidic soil in temporary pools that fill with melting snow water in the spring. In Italy it is only known for Piemonte, Valle d'Aosta, and Lombardia (Aleffi et al. 2020). Riccia breidleri is included in Annex II of the Habitats Directive of the EU and in the Appendix I of the Bern Convention, and considered Vulnerable in the European red list of bryophytes (Hodgetts et al. 2019 A group of solitary, but gregarious, basidiomata belonging to Inocybe langei was observed on the ground among the litter of Quercus pubescens trees. The pilei were broadly conical and slightly umbonate when young, then almost applanate with age, less than 3 cm wide, straw-coloured, but a bit darker ochre in the centre, and fibrillose.

Riccia breidleri
The stipe was pale, rather short and robust, with a slightly bulbose base, covered by crested caulocystidia especially along the upper half. The gills were beige-gray, the edge showing ventricose-lageniform and crested cheilocystidia. Spores were amygdaliform and 6.5-8.5 × 3.5-5 μm in size, thus shorter than those belonging to the closelyrelated species I. hirtella Bres., which is also characterised by the smell of almonds not recorded in our samples (Printz 1992;Courtecuisse and Duhem 1995). So far, Inocybe langei has been reported only in northern Italy (Onofri et al. 2013).
G A group of six small, gregarious and collybioid basidiomata was observed on the ground on the litter under a planted tree of Quercus robur. The youngest pilei were hemisphaeric convex and with an involute edge; the most mature ones were more applanate, matt, smooth, dark brown with a reddish tone in the centre, paler at the edge, and 1.0-2.5 cm wide. The lower side of the pileus showed distant, emarginated and pale yellowish gills supported by a lemon-yellow, slender, flexuose and fibrillose stipe with white rhizomorphs attached at the base. Spores were amygdaliform, smooth, hyaline, and 7-9 × 4-5 μm in size. Cheilocystidia were scattered and cylindrical, no pleurocystidia were observed. Smell and taste resulted indistinct. Based on the above characters and ecology, this fungus was identified as Xerophorus donadinii. This species, was first described as Callistosporium olivascens var. donadinii Bon, ecologically distinct from the proper C. olivascens (Boud.) Bon, currently X. olivascens (Bon) Vizzini, Consiglio & M.Marchetti, which prefers association with cedar trees. Further differences are also morphological: X. donadinii has pilei with smaller diameters, without an evident umbo, with a more reddish shade in the centre, and a paler and more involute edge; the stipe is also slenderer than in X. olivascens (Courtecuisse and Duhem 1995;Vizzini et al. 2020). In Italy, X. donadinii has so far been reported always on broadleaved trees, only in Emilia-Romagna, Marche, and Puglia (Vizzini et al. 2020 Printzen 1995); its distribution is now extended to Val Masino. It was collected in a moist, old-growth beech stand (Natura 2000 Habitat 9110 "Luzulo-Fagetum beech forests"), which is coherent with it having its optimum in humid beech forests (Nimis and Martellos 2023). It is listed in the Red List of Italian epiphytic lichens as "endangered" (Nascimbene et al. 2013  Calicium denigratum is recognizable for its tall, thin, and shiny black ascomata with stalk of sclerotized, dark, irregularly interwoven hyphae and distinct bellshaped capitulum lacking pruina. Spores have a coarsely cracked surface (Tibell 1999). The species could be confused with C. glaucellum Ach. and C. abietinum Pers. but the former has an obovoid to lenticular capitulum with white pruina and coarsely cracked spores with ridges and the latter has a black lenticular capitulum with minutely warted spores. This species occurs in open canopy woodlands in Europe and Siberia (Tibell 1999). It is reported also for North America (McMullin et al. 2012). This is the first Italian collection but the species is likely widespread throughout the Italian Alps.
G. Gheza Lecanora subcarpinea is a crustose epiphytic lichen belonging to the L. carpinea-L. leptyrodes complex, found on smooth and base-rich bark of isolated trees, which occurs also in well-lit or sparse forests, from the mesomediterranean to the subalpine belt. According to Nimis and Martellos (2023), it appears that this species has not always been correctly identified, and the Italian material collected so far would need revision. This sample, collected in the typical habitat of L. subcarpinea, is characterized by strongly pruinose apothecia and a distinct Pd+ bright yellow reaction of the apothecial margin, which is coherent with the taxon description.

Lecanora subcarpinea
J. Malíček, S. Ravera Opegrapha vermicellifera is a crustose lichen with Trentepohlia as photobiont, characterized by a pale grey to whitish thallus. Thalli without apothecia, such as the one found in Toblino, have numerous and prominent pycnidia. In Italy, the species usually colonises large trees in humid areas, especially along large rivers and lakes, both in the Padanian and subalpine regions (Nimis and Martellos 2023)  Placynthium nigrum is a saxicolous species distinguished by its dark thallus with a conspicuous bluish-black prothallus. Despite being a widespread species in the Alps (Nimis et al. 2018), P. nigrum is rarely collected in Valle d'Aosta (Piervittori and Isocrono 1999), where it is uncommon due to the regional climatic and geological characteristics. The only two previous records for this region were from a coniferous forest in Valpelline (Henry 1910), and from broad-leaved forest in Arnad (Henry 1914  Rhizocarpon norvegicum is a yellow-greenish crustose chlorolichen, which often starts its life cycle on thalli of Acarosporaceae on schistaceous rocks (Nimis and Martellos 2023). In Italy, it was reported so far only from Friuli Venezia Giulia and Trentino-Alto Adige (Nimis and Martellos 2023), but it is likely more widespread in the Italian Alps.
G. Gheza, J. Nascimbene Scytinium fragrans is a small-foliose to subsquamulose epiphytic cyanolichen occurring in natural or semi-natural habitats, extremely rare or extinct in northern Italy (Nimis and Martellos 2023), whose last report in Sicilia dates back to the beginning of the 1900s (Jatta 1909(Jatta -1911  Solenopsora liparina has a crustose-placodioid thallus, forming orbicular (up to 2.5 cm) rosettes, with the central parts sometimes falling off and leaving semicircular arcs of olivaceous grey or grey-green lobes, with rounded white-pruinose margins. It is a Mediterranean species colonizing inclined surfaces of ultrabasic rocks such as serpentines, often preferring fissures, in shaded situations also on vertical faces, in habitats with low eutrophication. So far in Italy it was recorded only from Liguria and Toscana (Guttová and Nimis 2021;Nimis and Martellos 2023). The distribution of S. liparina along the Apennine Peninsula seems strongly associated to a combination of geology (i.e. presence of serpentine and other ultramafic outcrops) and climate (preference for localities with temperate climate and warm winters) and recently developed habitat suitability maps highlighted higher probabilities of occurrence along the Tyrrhenian side (Guttová et al. 2019 Stereocaulon incrustatum typically grows on mineral oligotrophic soils, often near rivers (Nimis and Martellos 2023). It was reported from "the surroundings of Vercelli" with specimens collected in 1858 (Lamb 1977;Watson 2014;Oset 2015;TSB-25735;E.C.I. n. 194). This record confirms its occurrence in the area near Vercelli after more than 150 years since the latest record, and after more than a century since the last record from the same administrative region (Martel 1911). The analysed specimen contained only atranorin, which is reported as the most widespread chemotype by Oset (2015).
G. Gheza Verrucaria endocarpoides is one out of many species with a thick, brown, areolate thallus. It is characterized by immersed perithecia with an involucrellum reaching down to exciple-base level, medium-sized ascospores, and stout periphyses. The species is apparently widespread but poorly known. In Italy it was previously reported from Friuli (Breuss 2008a) and from its type locality in Liguria (Breuss 2008b, Servít 1952 Verrucaria lecideoides belongs to a small group of species with a distinctly areolate, epilithic, autonomous thallus and with perithecia mostly at the margins of, or between the areoles; its perithecia are encircled by an involucrellum that extends down to exciple-base level and incurves beneath. It does not fit within the (core group of ) genus Verruculopsis that is morphologically different, lacks an involucrellum and is parasitic on Teloschistacean hosts (Navarro-Rosinés et al. 2007). The species is widespread in Italy on exposed calciferous rocks (Nimis 2016;Nimis and Martellos 2023).