Summary:
Also listed in Polypores category. Features include 1) flat growth on wood with pores facing outward, 2) soft fruiting body when fresh, the whitish then ochraceous surface with rounded pores or especially on vertical substrates lacerate or labyrinthine pores, 3) indistinct, pruinose margin, and 4) microscopic characters. When Hyphodontia latitans was combined into Kneiffiella, a new species epithet was required due to the prior publication of Kneiffiella latitans based on a different holotype (Corticium latitans P. Karst. 1888). The description is derived from Eriksson(4) except where noted.

Microscopic:
spores 3-4 x 0.8 microns, narrowly allantoid, more or less curved, smooth, thin-walled, inamyloid; basidia 4-spored, 8-10 x 3-3.5 microns, short-cylindric, more or less constricted, with basal clamp connection; cystidia numerous in the hymenium, 30-35 x 4-5 microns, slightly projecting, cylindric or slightly fusiform, "somewhat sinuous and constricted", thin-walled, "obtuse, without incrustation"; hyphal system monomitic, hyphae about 3 microns wide, with clamp connections, "with somewhat thickened walls, frequently branching from clamp-cells or opposite clamp", hyphae of dissepiments arranged in parallel fashion, "those of the subiculum irregularly intertwined", "hyphae of the thickening subhymenium densely united", narrower and more thin-walled

Notes:
In the Pacific Northwest, Kneiffiella abdita is known from one collection in BC, (J. Ginns, pers. comm.). It has also been found in AR, AZ, FL, GA, IA, IL, IN, MD, MI, MS, NC, NM, SC, TN, and VA, (Ginns(5)). It also occurs in central Europe and Siberia in Russia, (Eriksson).

Synonyms and Alternate Names:
Hypoxylon coccinellum Sacc.
Hypoxylon multiforme (Fr.: Fr.) Fr. var. australe Cooke