Specimen #18: Stemonitis

Stemonitis

1. Stemonitis

Figure 2. Threads that make up the stalk

Phylum: Mycetzoa
Family: Stemonitdae
Genus: Stemonitis
Collection date: 9/8/2015
Collector: Caroline Kaylor Georskey
Habitat: Growing on the top of deadwood at the James. H. Barrow Field Station
Description: This acellular specimen was found growing on the top of deadwood. It is composed of many tightly packed fruiting bodies that measure between 0.5 and 1 cm tall  containing a stalk and sporangia. The stalk and sporangia were dark brown, but the sporangia became lighter as the dark spores were released (fig. 1). The stalk is made up of threads as seen in figure 2.
Key used: Keller, H. W., & K. L. Braun. (1999). Myxomycetes of Ohio: Their systematics, biology, and use in teaching. Columbus, Oh; Ohio Biological Survey College of Biological Sciences The Ohio State University.

Key to the Orders of Mycomycetes, p. 41
1. Spores borne internally within fructifications as a powdery spore mass surrounded by an acellular peridium...
2. Fruiting bodies larger and of various types and shapes, either sessile or stalked; not with the above combination of characters...
3. Capillitium present as true threads; collumella present or absent...
4. Spores dark colored black, violet-brown, purple-brown, or dark red in mass.
5. Calcerous deposits absent from fruitifications; stalk when present hollow or partially filled with strands...

Stemonitales, p. 98
1. Fructification sporangiate or sometimes massed together into a pseudoaethalium...
3. Fructification sporangiate, sporangia free or clustered, sometimes united into a pseudoaethalium, but then capillitium  not in coiled spirals...
4. Peridium single, not gelatinous when wet...
5. Collumella present; peridium variable but not as above...
6. Columella without a cupulate apical disk, the capillitium arising from the entire columella or from the sporgangial base...
7. Fructifications of various types, sessile or stalked stalks not translucent, either hollow or with fibrous strands usually larger than 0.5 mm in diameter...
8. Peridium early evanescent or, if present, thin, membranous, delicate...
9. Capillitial threads not united into a surface net, sometimes with a subsurface network, but with many free ends...

Stemonitis
For more information on Stemonitis please review the following links:
http://www.messiah.edu/Oakes/fungi_on_wood/club%20and%20coral/species%20pages/Stemonitis.htm
http://www.britannica.com/science/Stemonitis
http://www.discoverlife.org/20/q?search=Stemonitis+fusca