Zopfiella erostrata (Griffiths) Udagawa & Furuya, Trans. Mycol. Soc.

12. Zopfiella erostrata (Griffiths) Udagawa & Furuya, Trans. Mycol. Soc. View in CoL Japan 15(3): 208 (1974)

( Plate 1 View PLATE 1 , Fig. 30)

Ascomata non-ostiolate, scattered to gregarious, semi immersed to superficial, globose, metallic black in stereomicroscopy, dark brown to black in mounting, 300–450 μm diam. Hairs setose, simple, thick-walled, septate, smooth, dark brown to black, becoming less pigmented to near hyaline towards the apex, 4.8–6 μm diam. at the broadest part. Peridium pseudoparenchymatous, membranaceous, opaque, composed of angular ( textura angularis), brown to dark brown, thick-walled cells. Asci 8-spored, clavate, evanescent, irregularly biseriate, only observable in young cleistothecia. Ascospores 1-celled, lageniform to clavate and hyaline and when young, smooth, becoming swollen and forming a transversal septum to delimit a head and pedicel. Head cell subglobose, ovoid or lageniform, with umbonate apex and truncated base, smooth, brown to dark brown, 7.5–12.5 × 6–8.5 μm, guttulate, with a subapical germ pore. Pedicel cylindrical, thin-walled, occasionally collapsing, with rounded base, 6–10 × 2.5–5 μm. Apical caudae absent. Basal caudae absent.

Material examined: — BRAZIL. Pernambuco, Instituto Agronômico de Pernambuco ( IPA), Caruaru, on cattle dung, 06 Oct 2011, R. F. R. Melo ( URM 86757!), Serra Talhada, on horse dung, 13. Sep 2011, R. F. R. Melo ( URM 86758!).

Habitat: —On dung of many herbivores.

Distribution: —Worldwide.

Notes:— Zopfiella can be distinguished from other coprophilous lasiosphaeriaceous, which share similar ascospore morphology, due the presence of non-ostiolate ascomata with ascospores forming a head and a tail, occasionally with septate heads (previously allocated to Tripterospora Cain ). Zopfiella erostrata is a common representative of this genus on herbivore dung. The material from Pernambuco had a limited number of mature cleistothecia on the substrates, which were identified based on key characters such as ascomata with long dark brown to black, thick-walled hairs and ascospores with symmetrical head cells, differing from Z. longicaudata by the shorter pedicel, (6–10 × 2.5–5 μm.)