Some Species of the Genus Trichophaea

Abstract

Boudier (1885), in working toward a clarification of the taxonomy of the Discomycetes, established many new genera. His later works (1907, 1905-1910) further emphasized his revised classification. His system has not been accepted generally in its entirety because it has been claimed that it represented an artificial arrangement of the species. The genus Trichophaea Boud. comprises a concise taxonomic unit within the heterogeneous Lachnea complex, characterized in part by having small, fleshy, flat apothecia, white hymenium and brown hairs arising from excipular cells. Boudier (1907) transferred 18 species to the genus. Grelet (1917) added T. boudieri, and Le Gal (1937) named T. gregaria var. intermedia. Recently (1955) Le Gal made the new combination T. erinacea (Schw.) Le Gal from Peziza erinaceus Schw., a species described from a collection made in the United States. I have not seen collections from Brazil and Madagascar which she identified as T. erinacea, but it would appear from her discussion that she has misinterpreted Schweinitz's species. I believe that the species belongs in the genus Scutellinia. With the permission of Dr. W. C. Denison I refer to Publication 20.015 from the Cornell University Microfilms; Studies in the Genus Scutellinia, in which Dr. Denison treats P. erinaceus as belonging to Scutellinia. In 1942 Le Gal reported briefly on the spore ornamentation in T. paludosa Boud. In 1947 she published her valuable treatise Recherches sur les ornamentations sporales des Discomycetes opercules. Among the species she discussed were T. paludosa and, briefly, T. pseudogregaria (Rick) Boud. She presented a classification which in many respects followed Boudier, but which incorporates important modifications with respect both to taxonomy and phylogeny. Some of these views were included in a presentation before the Stockholm Congress in 1950 (pub. 1953) and again in her treatment (1955) of the Discomycetes of Madagascar. Seaver (1928) placed Trichophaea in syn-