Epicoccum anhuiense Y. Wang, Y. Tu, X. Chen, H. Jiang, H. Ren, Q. Lu, C. Wei & W. Lv sp. nov.

Fig. 6

Etymology.

Named after the location where it was collected, Anhui Province.

Description.

Sexual morph: undetermined. Asexual morph: Pycnidia smooth, subglobose to ellipsoidal, pale brown, attached to mycelium. Conidia ellipsoidal to subcylindrical, pale yellow to green, smooth- and thin-walled, abundant, generated from pycnidia, composed of a single cell, 10.5–16 × 4.5–8 µm (av. = 13.4 ± 1.4 × 6.3 ± 0.7 µm, n = 30). Mycelia lateral branching, septate, hyaline.

Culture characteristics.

Colonies on PDA reaching 75–79 mm diam. after 7 days at 28 ° C in the dark, margin regular, covered by floccose aerial mycelium, greyish; reverse pale brown to pale buff, white edges. Pycnidia and conidia produced on the colony surface after being cultured for 14 days at 28 ° C in the dark. Colonies on OA reaching 81–85 mm diam. after 7 days at 28 ° C in the dark, margin irregular, aerial mycelium flat, whitish; reverse concolorous.

Materials examined.

China, Anhui Province, Anqing City, from diseased leaves of C. sinensis cv. Longjingchangye, 16 Nov 2019, Y. C. Wang, Holotype HMAS 352388, culture ex-type CGMCC 3.24242 = YCW 961 . Yunnan Province, Puer City, Jingdong Yizu Autonomous County, from health leaves of C. sinensis, 13 Jun 2020, Y. C. Wang, culture ex-type CGMCC 3.24246 = YCW 1829 .

Notes.

Epicoccum anhuiense is closely related to E. latusicollum with high statistical support (Fig. 3). Epicoccum anhuiense has 5 bp differences in the TUB 2 sequence from E. latusicollum . In addition, E. anhuiense can be distinguished from E. latusicollum by the morphological features of its conidia and the conidia size of E. anhuiense (10.5–16 × 4.5–8 µm) is larger than that of D. prosopidis (4–6.5 × 2–3 µm). In the present study, eight strains were isolated from healthy or diseased tea plant leaves.