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Species Information
Summary: Features include 1) a small orange to golden brown fruitbody that bursts out from the bark of hardwoods especially Salix and Populus, remaining embedded in the bark, with a prominent margin that is often notched and whitish, 2) absent stem, and 3) microscopic characters.
Seaver lists Pezicula ocellata for NY to MB, WA, and CO. There are collections from BC at the Pacific Forestry Centre determined by A. Funk and by R. Shoemaker.
Upper surface: 0.1-0.25cm, developing under bark, tearing it open but remaining embedded in it with flat to somewhat concave disc dark orange to orange-brown in color; uneven and rough; margin turned upward, (Breitenbach), bursting through the bark but not fully erumpent, saucer-shaped; disc flat, up to 0.2cm across, golden brown with prominent margin, (Dennis), up to 0.1-0.2cm across, "breaking through the bark, the broken edges of which form a ragged margin often extending above the margin of the cup", "yellowish, with an irregularly notched margin that is often whitish", spore-bearing upper surface concave, or nearly flat, surrounded by the upturned margin of the fruitbody, yellowish or dull orange, (Seaver)
Stem: sessile, attached to the substrate by a scanty subiculum, (Dennis)
Microscopic: spores 27-32 x 12-13.5 microns, broadly elliptic, smooth, colorless, with granular contents, with or without droplets, uniseriate to biseriate; asci 8-spored, 133 x 21 microns, iodine colors the pore red-brown; paraphyses cylindric, forked and with slight clavate widenings toward the tips, septate, (Breitenbach), spores 20-30(40) x 8-12(14) microns, broadly elliptic, colorless or yellowish, uniseriate or biseriate according to their number, asci 4-spored or 8-spored, up to 130 x 25 microns, clavate, thick-walled, the broad pore deep blue with iodine; paraphyses 3 microns wide at tip, slender, branched; subiculum of almost colorless hyphae 5-6 microns wide, (Dennis), spores 25-30 x 10-12 microns, elliptic, granular within, colorless, simple or 1-3-septate, irregularly biseriate; asci reaching a length of 120 microns and a width of 24 microns, broad-clavate, ending abruptly at base; paraphyses widened in upper part, reaching a width of 5-6 microns; conidia "borne on the surface of a fleshy, submerged stroma, large, ellipsoid, densely filled with granular matter, reaching a length of 30-35 microns and a width of 10-12 microns borne on a conidiophore about the length of the spore itself and strongly swollen just below the point of attachment", (Seaver)
Habitat / Range
single to gregarious on dead branches and twigs, still with bark, of Populus (poplar), and Salix (willow), spring and fall, (Breitenbach), scattered on Salix branches in spring, also on Hippophae, Populus, and Rhamnus, (Dennis), singly on branches of Salix petiolaris, Salix discolor and other species of Salix and Populus, (Seaver)
