Mastigocladus laminosus Cohn ex Kirchner (1898: 39)

Mcgregor, Glenn B., 2018, Freshwater Cyanobacteria of North-Eastern Australia: 3. Nostocales, Phytotaxa 359 (1), pp. 448-450 : 448-450

Mastigocladus laminosus Cohn ex Kirchner (1898: 39) Fig. 32 A–D.

Thallus membranous, leathery, spongy or firm, often layered, blue-green to olive green in colour. Filaments densely entangled, contorted or irregularly flexuous with thin, distinct, gelatinous sheaths, T-, V-, or Y-type true branched, 4–8 (–10) μm wide; branches usually narrower than the main filaments. Trichomes usually divicariate at right angles, constricted in mature parts, cylindrical and sometimes unconstricted in branches. Vegetative cells barrel-shaped and of irregular lengths along the main filaments, cylindrical in branches and often distinctly longer than wide; apical cells cylindrical and rounded. Heterocytes intercalary, spherical, ellipsoidal or cylindrical, 6.5 (–7) μm wide × 9 μm long, solitary or in pairs.

Specimens examined:—Nettle Ck at Innot Hot Springs, Talaroo Thermal Springs.

Other records:— Queensland: Bedkira Bore, J.W. Cribb, 1978 (BRI 0701247), Townsville, Cires et al. (2014).

Observations:—Thermophilic species, recorded from almost all hot spring sites throughout the world below an upper temperature limit of about 58 oC ( Castenholz 1996, McGregor & Rasmussen 2007).

NOSTOCHOPSIS