A Further Note on Caloplaca tominii Savicz in the Americas

Abstract

Caloplaca tominii occurs widely in North America as well as in South America. The excellent article by Nimis (1981) on the occurrence of Caloplaca tominii in North America led to a reexamination of the material of Caloplaca cirrochroa in wis including especially those specimens that occurred on soil. As predicted by Nimis, this species of calcareous soils high in clay has a much wider distribution in North America than hitherto suspected. In addition, it occurs in the deserts of South America. The following specimens give us an expanded conception of the New World range of this species. CANADA. Ellesmere Island: Hilgard Bay, vicinity of Alert, 1956, Schuster 35907; lake at head of Clements Markham Inlet, over mosses, 82038'N, 69000'W, 1969, Brassard 4204. YUKON: Sheep Mt., Kluane Lake, on silt, 1970, Hoefs 4. UNITED STATES. UTAH: Canyonlands National Park, Kleiner, 1976. WASHINGTON: in solonetzic depression in Agropyron-Poa grassland, Ashotin, 1958, Daubenmire 576. PERU. DEPT. AREQUIPA: Prov. Camana just north of fog zone ENE of Camana, 1963, Iltis & Ugent 1403 (this locality discussed by Thomson & Iltis 1968). It would appear from these records that Caloplaca tominii belongs to the same floristic element-western North America and Greenland--as discussed by Brodo & Alstrup (1981) for Bryoria subdivergens and several other lichens. Ellesmere Island is to be added to the records, however, thus giving a distribution similar to that of Buellia elegans Poelt, for which the North American specimens were hitherto treated as Buellia epigaea (Looman 1964; Thomson 1972). The soil specimens treated as Caloplaca cirrochroa in Looman's Table 1 and discussion of his association Parmelietum chlorochroae from South Dakota, Wyoming, Montana, and Saskatchewan also belong to Caloplaca tominii. The lack of records for this species in herbaria may partly be due to the frequency with which it occurs in the sterile condition and partly because it occurs on fine silty soils that disintegrate in the collections and in shipping. Publication aided by the Norman C. Fasset Memorial Fund. Brodo, I. M. & V. Alstrup. 1981. The lichen Bryoria subdivergens (Dahl) Brodo & Hawksw. in Greenland and North America. THE BRYOLOGIST 84: 229-235. Looman, J. 1964. The distribution of some lichen communities in the prairie provinces and adjacent parts of the Great Plains. THE BRYOLOGIST 67: 209-224. Nimis, P. L. 1981. Caloplaca tominii new to North America. THE BRYOLOGIST 84: 222-225. Thomson, J. W. 1972. Distribution patterns of American Arctic lichens. Canadian Journal of Botany 50: 1135-1156. & H. H. Iltis. 1968. A fog-induced lichen community in the coastal desert of southern Peru. THE BRYOLOGIST 71: 31-34. 007-2745/82/251$0.25/0 This content downloaded from 157.55.39.208 on Fri, 14 Oct 2016 04:20:57 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms