OPEGRAPHA vulgata.
Common Opegrapha.
CRYPTOGAMIA Algae.
Gen. Char. Seeds in black, linear, sessile, simple or
branched, bordered clefts, in an uninterrupted crust.
Spec. Charj Crust thin, indeterminate, greenish grey,
somewhat scaly. Clefts small, linear, divaricated,
zigzag, simple or branched, with a thick edge
and very narrotV disk.
Syn. Opegrapha vulgata. Ach. Meth. 21.
Lichen vulgatus. Ach. Prod. 2 1 5 synonyms all
perhaps erroneous.
A VERY common Opegrapha, generally Overlooked as a bad
or imperfect state of the more elegant species. It grows
chiefly in the clefts and hollows of the bark of old trees, especially
fir.
The crust is indeterminate, but sufficiently evident, running
in small irregular blotches, of a greenish pale grey, its surface
roughish or scaly, in our specimens often sprinkled with little
black dots or warts, perhaps young or abortive fructification.
Clefts numerous, scattered and divaricated in all directions,
neverv parallel; they are small, zigzag, of various lengths,
simple or branched, having a narrow disk and thick inflexed
border. In Dr. Acharius’s own specimens the fructification
is often branched, and we are inclined to think that few species
of Opegrapha have truly simple clefts, which Mr. Turner also
has hinted to us.
Dr. Acharius seems doubtful whether this may be the Lichen
rugosus of Linnseus. No doubt many things were confounded
by that great man under this as well as other intricate crypto-
gatnic species, but we rather presume 0 . epiphega to be his
L. rugosus. We have not however examined what Dillenius’s
t. 18. f . 2. precisely represents.