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Sarcographa labyrinthica
I noticed these splotches on my Wayusa Tree (Ilex guayusa) when getting leaves for my morning tea ritual. I have no idea what they are or how long they have been there. They spread up to 8 cm along the branch and halfway around. They don't seem to appear on the bottom side of any branches. It is a blue green patch with irregular white spots in it. The main tree trunk splits into 7 branches from the ground. Only 3 of the 7 have these splotches.
Found on 3 of the 7 branches of a smallish (5-7 m) Wayusa tree (Ilex guayusa) in the Amazon rainforest of SE Ecuador (700 masl).
Through the help of PN members in the comments section below, this was identified. PN is constantly pushing me to learn. It's great!!!
Brian, I blew up the third picture on your link and put it beside a blown up picture of mine and, although the one from the link isn't as good of quality, it looks similar enough that I am going to go with your suggestion. Thanks a bunch.
The following link puts Sarcographa labyrinthica in South America and several other places. Barring any objections, I'm going with Brian's suggestion. Thanks Brian. I really appreciate your interest in this too Saturniidae and Machi.
https://www.anbg.gov.au/abrs/lichenlist/...
Widely distributed in eastern Qld, N.S.W. and Vic.; also in South America, Mexico, U.S.A. (Florida), Thailand, the Philippines, Indonesia, New Zealand and Norfolk Island.
Sarcographa labyrinthica is a tropical script lichen. Still a little tentative on this suggestion but look at these pictures https://www.waysofenlichenment.net/liche... Can you add any cropped or close up pics of the white areas? - that will help in species determination. I also just read an article on line that this lichen has recently been found in Thailand.
Hi Brian. I was wondering if you were going to get involved in this :-) I pulled up the link you gave and thought that it's not the same. The next picture down looked better, but the third one really looks right. I think the difference is that your link shows the lichen on a tree with rough bark and the Ilex guayusa is a smooth barked tree. Saturniidae and Machi, what do you think? Lichens are waaaaay out of my area of expertise. I realize Brian's is from NA and I live in SA. I'll hold off a little and see if I can confirm or disprove Brian's suggestion. But finding nothing else, will change the name. Thanks much Brian. I know that took a lot of digging.
Thanks for continuing to look you two. The thing that's throwing me is that I can't find anything that has a dark (in this case green) patch that contains the white spots. Clear in fotos 1 & 3. Everything I find has the white spots directly on the branch, not within a self-containing patch. Thanks much. I'll keep looking. At least now I know it's a lichen.
I found something similar to yours Tukup.
http://www.distractednaturalist.com/2011...
Thanks Machi. I was hoping you would weigh in on this. All the lichens I have found are white with darker spots, not dark with white spots. I'm coming up empty on this.
They look to me like white crustose lichens, due to the way they grow on trunks of trees, especially with moss growing with them.
Spotted on Jan 2, 2020
Submitted on Jan 5, 2020
