Summary:
Features include minute, translucent-white cups on fern stems, hairs on margin and exterior, absent or inconspicuous stem, and microscopic characters including small rod-like spores and lanceolate paraphyses. Dennis(3) described Dasyscypha washingtonensis from part of the type collection of Hyalopeziza pteridis Kanouse Mycologia 39: 660. 1947 (= Lachnella pteridicola Seaver) - he emphasized the broadly lanceolate (not filiform) paraphyses which would not be consistent with Hyalopeziza, but he did not exclude the remote possibility of a mixed collection. Albotricha washingtonensis is not to be confused with Lachnella pteridis Phill., the name that forced the change of epithet to pteridicola when Seaver moved the species from Hyalopeziza to Lachnella. According to Haines(1), this is a common species in the spring in western Washington, "but it is easily overlooked due to its small size. It is only known from the fern Pteridium aquilinum.".

Microscopic:
spores 5-7 x 0.75-1 microns, bacillar, biseriate; asci 8-spored, 33 x 5 microns, cylindro-clavate; paraphyses 55 x 4-5 microns, broadly lanceolate [wider in middle and tapered at both ends], apices acute, extending beyond the asci; hairs septate, tapering to an acute tip, thickening at the base to about 5 microns, (Dennis), spores 6-8 x 1-1.5 microns, clavate to fusoid; asci 27-35 x 4-6 microns; paraphyses 4-5 microns wide, up to 20 microns exceeding the asci; marginal hairs up to 75 microns long and 2-2.5 microns wide, colorless, (Hansen, L.), spores 4-5.5 x 0.75-1 microns, bacilloid; asci 8-spored, reaching a length of 30-35 microns and a width of 4.5 microns; paraphyses filiform; hairs reaching a length of 75 microns, and width of 6 microns, hyaline-white, rough, (Seaver), spores 4-5.5 x 0.75-1 microns, rod-like, straight, colorless, one-celled; asci 8-spored, 30-35 x 4.5 microns, cylindric-clavate, spores obliquely arranged in the asci, ascus pore blue with iodine; paraphyses filiform; exciple composed of small prismatic cells from which arise long, rough, colorless, septate hairs 75 microns long and 6 microns wide at the widest (middle) part, (Kanouse), spores 4-8 x 1-2.5 microns, "mostly clavate-fusiform, slightly curved, somewhat variable in shape, size and appearance of contents, often with a variable number of refractive droplets, non-septate or rarely with a single pseudoseptum, irregularly biseriate in the ascus"; asci 8-spored, 4-5 x 20-25 microns, colorless, thin-walled, tip slightly conical, pore plug very large but visible only at maturity; paraphyses 30-40 x 3-4 microns, exceeding asci by up to 5-10 microns, "broadly lanceolate ending in a small slightly rounded tip, non-septate, thin-walled", colorless "with granular appearing contents"; hairs 10-35 x 4-5 microns, scarce, "tapering to a fine point at the tip", colorless, sparsely covered with large, irregular granules up to 2 microns in diameter, thin-walled, "usually adhering to one another, occurring only near the edge of the cup, multiseptate", septa forming cells 7-10 microns long, "often with refractive, granular-appearing contents"; excipulum of thin-walled, colorless, short-cylindric to isodiametric cells up to 10 microns long, (Haines(1))

Notes:
A. washingtonensis was described from WA, and is found also in Europe. There are 2 collections by O. Ceska from BC at the University of British Columbia.

Synonyms and Alternate Names:
Dasyscyphus washingtonensis Dennis