First report of the white rotting fungus Sarcodontia crocea in Armenia
Article Category: Short communication
Online veröffentlicht: 13. März 2021
Seitenbereich: 65 - 67
Eingereicht: 24. Jan. 2021
Akzeptiert: 28. Jan. 2021
DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/ffp-2021-0006
© 2021 Arsen Gasparyan, Andrzej Szczepkowski, published by Sciendo
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Armenia is a mountainous and small landlocked country, located in the South Caucasus region. Being part of the Caucasus biodiversity hotspot, it is also well known for rich biodiversity and notable level of endemism (Anonymous 2014). More than 1200 species of macroscopic fungi are known from Armenia, including 40 taxa registered in the Red Data Book of Armenia (Tamanyan et al. 2010).
The species is widespread, but at the same time rare and threatened within its distribution range. According to the recently assessed conservation status, it is listed in the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species as Vulnerable A2c+3c+4c. The major threat is intensive orchard/ garden management, which reflects in the removal of old fruit trees and subsequent decline of the species population (Iršėnaitė 2019).
In this short communication, we report the finding of
Macroscopic features of mature basidiome were studied with light microscope and the species identification was followed by Breitenbach & Kränzlin (1986) and Bernicchia & Gorjón (2010). The voucher specimen was deposited at the herbarium of the Lichen Research and Conservation Group at the A. Takhtajyan Institute of Botany National Academy of Sciences, Republic of Armenia.
Figure 1
Basidiome of
The gathered fresh basidiome had a typical hymenophore characterized by bright sulphur-yellow dense spines (up to 20 mm long and 1 mm in diameter) becoming ochre-brown at a later stage. The features mentioned earlier, as well as other properties of the macroscopic and microscopic structure of the basidioma collected in the new locality, were consistent with those given by Breitenbach & Kränzlin (1986) and Bernicchia & Gorjón (2010). The species was discovered in the old and unmanaged fruit tree orchard, with mostly apple trees. The orchard is situated in the residental area near the temperate broad-leaf forest predominated by Oriental beech (
Private orchard of Mr. Ashot Davtyan, Vahagni village, Lori province, 40°54’09.6” N 44°36’21.3” E, 1130 m, on wood of fallen branch of apple tree, 05 July 2020, leg. A. Gasparyan, rev. A. Szczepkowski.
Taking into account, that the species is globally threatened, we emphasize the implementation of urgent conservation measures locally. Following the regulations and criteria for the Red Data Book of Armenia, based on D criterion (less than 50 mature individuals), we assess the species as Critically Endangered (CR D). We also recommend to include the species in the upcoming edition of the Red Data Book of Armenia with proposal to implement further research on population size and distribution of the species in the country.