Cyanobacteria forming dark, dense mats on moss growing on the ground along the trail.
Ran into the path and stopped on a rock right in front of me. Thus, this was a lucky find and one that made me very happy.
At blacklight after dark in pine-oak barrens/sand prairie complex. On a moth. ???
I have not been able to find anything similar online other than a spider found in New Zealand
On well decayed wood and in dirt in a hardwood forest
Found under my garbage can when taking the trash out. Really challenging the notion these guys need old growth forests. They likely use the artificial pond in my neighborhood for breeding.
This was first seen by @smellyturkey who's observation you can see here: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/200154535
I think I saw this species last year:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/154667088
Habitat: Moss (Most likely Brachythecium or some similar pleurocarp) growing in a shaded wall of concrete.
Most fruiting bodies are less than a cm and have basal mycelium on the moss.
The first microscopy photo is in Melzer's reagent and the second in KOH.
Currently spores seem to grow and germinate in culture.
1 small fruit body was sequenced, but does not match the previous sequence obtained for this species. I'm inclined to think that the original sequence was contaminated as it was taken from a not so clean culture. I will update this with additional culture and fruitbody sequences. That being said, I will not upload this to genbank until I know for certain that the sequence read is good.
On another note hopefully I can find this again or can get multiple collections of this. I'll have to check the spot from last year.
If new sequences keep coming back as novel and I can't find anything in the literature I will take a crack at describing this as a new species (So long as I can get more than just ITS)
Found under a rock on a south facing ridge in the peak heat of a warm late winter afternoon by Lucas.
Clackamas County
Found this amazing little guy in the brush in my yard.
On grasses, artemisia, and herbaceous vegetation in open hillside shrubland.
46°F, steady showers. The rear left foot had two toes fused together.
I tried collecting some to look at under the microscope, but they were so small I feared crushing them. I'll return with a small paintbrush or something to assist this week.
On a hardwood tree. Soft, jelly-like consistency.
Dr. Priscila Chaverri and her teaching assistant, Efraín Escudero-Leyva of the Instituto Politécnico Nacional in Mexico, were the course’s resident ascomycetologists. As this initially resembled one of the green Hypocrea/Trichoderma spp., I passed it off to them, thinking light work would be made of the ID process. After some microscopy and reference checking, Efraín returns with the name Dactylospora, a (mostly) lichenicolous genus in the Lecanorales.
This is one of the most beautiful fungi I have ever seen, and I greatly look forward to discovering the rest of its name.
UPDATE 8/28/16: Believed to be a member of the genus Abrothallus by multiple members of the “Ascomycetes of the World” Facebook group. Name updated accordingly.
Substrate: unk. foliose lichen (Observation 249900)
Habitat: Costa Rican Páramo
Ecoregion: Talamanca Montane Forests (NA0167)
Collector(s): D. Newman
Collection #: n/a
Collected for the 2016 Organization for Tropical Studies “Fungi and Fungus-Like Organisms” Course
From Berlese-Tullgren funnel test run. I think it was from stream gulley.
Chela has some bothriotricha in the middle of the hand on the side of the fixed finger, Coxal spines confined to first coxa -> Apochthonius.
This is a pretty old key https://archive.org/details/biostor-228299/page/n1/mode/1up there are some newer articles on Minimus/Moestus but the most obvious difference seems to be size, so I’m waiting until i get measurements.
I counted 8 setae on anterior margin of carapace (but i lost a lot of setae or I could have missed the lateral one), male genitalia have a single row of 6 guard setae. The chelal
teeth all seem pretty triangular to me, not having parallel sides even towards the end of the chela. We’ll see what measurements say.
On dead, attached needles of Abies grandis.
=Toxosporium camptospermum
Very small
Mounted in Melzers reagent
Asci measure around 245.9 × 25.5 µm
In sediment under cobble of upper intertidal, rocky beach during -0.53m low tide.
(?)
not sure what this was
Spores about 8-10 microns (a little small for P. vulgaris per Ascomycete Fungi of North America, listing at 12-14 and closer to P. cupressina listed at 9-12). Spores round, granular within, uniseriate, which excludes similar species (from AFoNA) Pseudopithyella miniscula with elliptic spores and Hymenoscyphus epiphyllus with narrowly elliptic spores. Originally thought this was Pithya vulgaris, but the lowland growth area and Thuja host (not Abies or Sequoia as in P. vulgaris), as well as smaller spore size are a better match for P. cupressina. Micro photos mounted in water after rehydrating in KOH.
Exact location :
Cedar trail
220 ft elevation berlese flowthrough
45 26’ 19’’ N 122 40’ 52’’ W
Exact location :
Cedar trail
200ft elevation berlese flowthrough 45 26’ 20’’ N 122 40’ 52’’ W
Found in soil ~5-10 cm below surface while digging out the roots of cardoons. Appeared stratified with at least three distinct layers, each 2-4 cm high, separated by ~3 cm of unaffected soil. Primarily attached to soil but also found covering a rock. No visible wood was present. Additional photos available. After removing the cardoons, the soil was returned to the hole… should anyone want to drop by and get a sample.
Chickadee with deformed beak. Very disheveled-looking, so much so that I initially wondered if it could be a new species for the yard. I presume it can't groom itself with full function.
This observation is for whatever is causing the beak deformation. Observation for the bird is here https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/164200322
Strange red powder on dead decaying dragonfly
??? Purple color on bark and Cladonia. From what?