Vaucheria cf. conifera Christensen, 1987

Muralidhar, Abishek, Broady, Paul A., Macintyre, Duncan P., Wilcox, Michael D., Garrill, Ashley & Novis, Phil M., 2014, Morphological and phylogenetic characterization of seven species of Vaucheria (Xanthophyceae), including two new species, from contrasting habitats in New Zealand, Phytotaxa 186 (3), pp. 117-136 : 132

Vaucheria cf. conifera Christensen

Siphons 35–50 µm diameter, branches sparse.

Section:— Woroninia ( Solms-Laubach 1867: 366) Heering (1907: 138) .

Representative specimen:— NEW ZEALAND: Auckland: Whangateau Harbour (36.335604° S, 174.765502° E), M. D. Wilcox, 31 August 2011, 4431b (AK 328489) .

Molecular data:— This strain was grouped in a robust clade making up species of the sect. Woroninia ( V. dichotoma ( Linnaeus 1753: 1165) Martius (1817: 304) , V. schleicheri De Wildeman (1895: 591) and V. conifera ; Fig. 2 ).The closest relative to our strain in terms of p-distance (p-distance = 0.060) was a V. conifera strain from a mangrove on Garden Island, Adelaide, Australia.

Notes:— We have named this strain Vaucheria cf. conifera based on molecular analyses, pending observation of fertile material. Growths were short turfs on shaded decaying rock in Whangateau Harbour, at the mouth of the Omaha Estuary. Although the location is estuarine, salinity is close to that of seawater as river flows are small relative to the total volume of the estuary ( Kelly 2009). There are no reports of V. conifera from New Zealand. It has been recorded previously from coastal south-eastern Australia ( Christensen 1987a; Entwisle 1988a).

Figures

FIGURE 2. 50% majority rule consensus tree showing Bayesian phylogenies of Vaucheria strains from different habitats in New Zealand (indicated in bold) based on the phylogenetic analysis of the rbcL gene and partial rbcL-rbcS spacer region. Support numbers and branches are Bayesian posterior probabilities/ Maximum Parsimony bootstrap values. The different taxonomic sections of the strains are as in Andersen and Bailey (2002) and the presence and absence of a gametophore bearing antheridia and oogonia are indicated beside the tree. Scale bar = 0.1 substitutions/site. Substitution model and data sets described in text.