Day 6: I knew I had a surprise coming in the mail from my sister-of-the-heart Patty, and saw by its tracking progress that it was due for Wednesday delivery. Patty had warned me that it was perishable and fragile, so I was in a hurry to get home from work to liberate it, whatever it might be. I slit the tape and opened the box to find another box made of clear plastic, and in it a mass of...LICHENS!
Y'know, I'm a cheap date. It doesn't take much effort or expense to entertain me. I was going to leave the project for morning and better light, but I was just too curious about the foliose species which had caused me to blurt "Rag-bag!" before I'd even felt the specimen. Okay, it resembled our local limp-washrag Platismatia, but there were some distinct differences which told me it wasn't the same thing. I spent the next 45 minutes with Skunk squashed under the 40-pound field guide on my lap and a lighted magnifier pressed tightly to my eye as I analyzed the black pycnidia along the lobe margins and searched for pseudocyphellae. At last I was content with an identification: Platismatia tuckermanii, named for lichenologist Edward Tuckerman who likewise lent his surname to Mount Washington's famous Tuckerman Ravine. He also has a whole genus of lichens named for him: Tuckermanopsis. There are still a couple of other species to sort out in this best-prezzie-ever, but I think they need to hydrate a little longer.
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