Another Nettle Fungus

AS couple of weeks ago, at Cwm Taf Fechan, I collected some tiny club shaped fungi, growing on the lower part of a dead stinging nettle stem. At home, I identified it as Acrospermum compressum and confirmed it by creating a squash of one of the fruiting bodies and viewing the thread-like ascospores under the microscope.

Yesterday, while looking for Glyphium elatum on the trees along the Bryn Du gas tank access road, I came across it again, on one of the dead nettle stems there. It is easy to recognise and is the only club shaped fungus one is likely to find on decaying nettle stems. Reputed to be common, it certainly doesn't seem to be as common as black, onion domed Leptosphaeria acuta.

The clubs were 2-3mm tall and often clustered. The photos aren't as good as I'd hoped, due to having to use an extension tube with my macro lens and hand hold the camera.

I was pleased to see that the brambles have been cut back from the Pyramidal Orchid site and the scrub on the Small Blue bank thinned.

In a sink hole, up on Onllwyn, I found the fern rusts, Milesina blechni and M. kriegeriana on Hard Fern and Broad Buckler Fern, respectively. I also thought I had found the Goblin Gold moss (Schistostegia pennata) in one of the deeper clefts in the sink hole, but wasn't completely convinced. I will have to go back with my Papillio bins and strap my torch to them for a better look.