Cladonia Squamosa

Day 14: Walking along a short trail in Black Lake Meadows (a small wetland area south of Capitol Mall in Tumwater), I checked up short at the sight of a mound of very scaly little lichens covering a stump of unknown wood no more than a foot high or wide. My first thought was that the lichen was Cladonia bellidiflora, the most squamous of the Cladonias, but on closer observation, I saw that the apothecia were a pinkish-tan colour rather than brilliant red. That feature alone ruled out bellidiflora, so the next fifteen minutes were spent on my knees in the wet grass under light rain trying to obtain a photo from an angle which showed the full morphology of what I believed to be Cladonia squamosa, although I had reservations due to the abundant apothecia.

Updating: I've had one of those "D'uh!" moments. I should have recognized this species immediately because it's quite common in the Pacific Northwest. I'd just never seen it fruiting quite so abundantly. It is Stereocaulon paschale, "Easter Lichen." The remainder of my description has been revised to reflect the corrected identification.

For the uninitiated, "squamous" means "scaly," referring to the pale green shingles on the stalks (podetia) of this species. The apothecia are the fruiting bodies, those little knobs along the upper margins.