Pebbled Pixie Cup (Cladonia pyxidata)

A Singular Cladonia pyxidata. The podetia are covered with small squamules or granules terminating in a deep goblet shaped cup with round squamules on the inside and round granules on the outside. The apothecia are brown. Found on a moss covered rock. Canada,Cladonia pyxidata,Geotagged,Winter

Appearance

Exterior variably clothed with corticate granules and sometimes also with small squamules, interior with conspicuous, disk-like, corticate granules (sometimes developing into squamules within the cup), soredia absent; basal squamules small, lacking pink tints, margins flat, smooth; apothecia brown, globose, more or less sessile on the podetial margins or on very short, stalk-like proliferations (<5mm)

A Study of (Hopefully) Cladonia pyxidata. This photographic project started as a record keeping photo of this lichen growing on a moss covered granite rock. The large “cup” on the right side is about 11mm across. After looking at the photo more closely I noted those bright spots on top of those “mini cups”. Turns out they have collected moisture from our recent fog. The collection provided a natural magnifying glass to see the inside of these little cups. The images give more weight to the common name “Pebbled Pixiecup Lichen”. I would like to tell you I had to walk a great distance to take these photos when in fact they were taken three steps from our back door! If my ID is incorrect please let me know. Canada,Cladonia pyxidata,Geotagged,Pebbled Pixie Cup

Naming

(L.) Hoffm. 1796

References:

Some text fragments are auto parsed from Wikipedia.

http://www.lichens.lastdragon.org/Cladonia_pyxidata.html
http://eol.org/pages/196465/names

Taxonomy
Kingdom	Fungi
Division	Ascomycota
Class	Lecanoromycetes
Order	Lecanorales
Family	Cladoniaceae
Genus	Cladonia
Species	Cladonia pyxidata

Photographed in
Canada
France