The genus Japewiella Printzen, gen. nov. is separated from Japewia Tynsberg and placed in the family Lecanoraceae. Japewiella pacifica Printzen, sp. nov. is described as new. The species is closely related to the southwestern European J. carrollii (Coppins & P. James) Printzen, comb. nov. and the East Asian J. djagensis (Zahlbr.) Printzen, comb. nov. Differences between Japewia and Japewiella are discussed. Like the closely related Megalaria Hafellner and Tasmidella Kantvilas, Hafellern, & Elix, Japewiella seems to be a genus of humid temperate and subtropical regions, whereas the two known species of Japewia show a boreal-(sub)arctic-alpine distribution. The lichen genus Lecidea Ach. is one of the most heterogeneous of Zahlbruckner's artificial system and a large number of genera have been separated from it, especially during the last 30 years. Most systematic studies on Lecidea have been concerned with saxicolous species groups, but a number of recent studies deal with the non-saxicolous species groups as well. One of these groups was treated by Tensberg (1990). In his paper, he assigned J. tornoensis (Nyl.) Tensberg and J. carrollii (Coppins & P. James) Tensberg, which were formerly kept under Lecidea, and a new species, J. subaurifera Muhr & Tensberg to the newly described genus Japewia. The three species of this new genus were separated from the rest of Lecidea s. lat. predominantly on the basis of their thick-walled ascospores. In the original description, Tensberg (1990) also emphasized the following characters: asci with a conspicuous axial body, branched and anastomosing paraphyses and excipular hyphae, and the presence of a reddish brown epihymenium formed by pigmented caps surrounding the paraphysis tips. Although a young and still small genus, Japewia is already riddled with systematic and nomenclatural problems. The systematic position of Lecidea tornoensis Nyl. had been subject to discussion for years. Generic affinities with Mycoblastus (Anderson & Carmer 1974) or Miltidea (James in Poelt & Vtzda 1977) were proposed. When describing L. carrollii Coppins & P. James, they (Coppins & James 1979) discussed similarities between this species and L. tornoensis. Hafellner (1984) proposed to unite these two species in a new genus; T~nsberg (1990) finally did this by describing Japewia. Recently, doubts have been expressed whether J. carrollii was really congeneric with J. tornoensis (Kalb & Hafellner 1992). For nomenclatural reasons, Printzen (1997) proposed to conserve Lecidea carrollii against L. tavaresiana H. Magn. Earlier, L. djagensis Zahlbr. from China proved to be related to J. carrollii (Printzen 1995). This and the finding of another undescribed species of this group from Mexico showed that J. tornoensis and J. subaurifera on one hand and J. carrollii and allied species on the other hand differ in distribution. While the first two are boreal-(sub)arctic, more or less circumpolar species, the latter group occurs in humid temperate and subtropical regions. As the generic position of the new species had to be clarified, a closer investigation of Japewia and similar species was necessary and the results are presented below. MATERIAL AND METHODS The study is based on material deposited in ASU, BG, BM, GZU, LISU, M, MIN, SANT, UPS, and the private herbaria of A. Aptroot (Baarn, The Netherlands), J. Etayo (Pamplona, Spain), J. Hafellner (Graz, Austria), K. Kalb (Neumarkt, Germany), and C. Printzen (Koln, Germany). Species were hand-sectioned and mounted in water, Lugol's solution or lactophenol cotton blue. Spore measurements were made on sections mounted in water; measurements of ascomatal structures follow Printzen (1995). Spore measurements are given as (smallest single measurement-) smallest mean-largest mean (-largest single measurement). Spot test reactions were carried out on hand sections of thalli and apothecia under the microscope. Lichen substances were identified by HPTLC (Arup et al. 1993) and HPLC (Feige et al. 1993). Specimens of Japewia tornoinsis examined.-SWEDEN. TORNE LAPPMARK. Abisko, Tal von Ballinviggi, 1991, Printzen 2226 (hb. Printzen); Abisko, Opferplatz Paddustievva SE von Abisko, 1991, Printzen 2314 (hb. Printzen). LULE LAPPMARK. Jokkmokk, Aktse, ramulos Abietis, 1871, Hellbom (M). Specimens of Japewia aff tornoinsis examined.CANADA. BRITISH COLUMBIA. Vancouver Island, Victoria Watershed, 1994, Aptroot 35092, 35121 (hb. Aptroot). U.S.A. CALIFORNIA. Del Norte Co., Patrick Creek Campground, US Hwy 199, 1936, Harris 3570 (MIN). WASHINGTON. Cowlitz Co., 8 km SW of summit of Mount St. Helens, E of Goat Mt., N of Goat Marsh Lake, 1994, Tynsberg 20060a (BG). 0007-2745/99/714-719$0.75/0 This content downloaded from 157.55.39.255 on Mon, 23 May 2016 06:04:39 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms 1999] PRINTZEN: JAPEWIELLA 715