Cainia graminis
Anamorph: not known.
Teleomorph: stromata absent. Ascomata scattered or in small clusters, visible externally as effuse to well-defined dark grey to black slightly domed clypeus-like structures with papillate ostioles, usually covering a single ascoma. Ascomata 350-500 µm diam. and 300-450 µm tall, subglobose, the ostiole lined with periphyses. Peridium 20-30 µm thick, composed of an outer layer of dark brown angular cells and an inner layer of hyaline flattened tissue. Interascal tissue of unbranched thin-walled paraphyses 3-4.5 µm diam., immersed in copious mucous gel. Asci 170-200 x 25-36 µm, cylindrical to cylindric-clavate, with a fairly short tapering stalk, the apex obtuse, fairly thick-walled but not fissitunicate, with a very large conspicuous J+ apical ring structure, 8-spored. Ascospores biseriately arranged, 30-33 x 12-13.5 µm, fusiform-ellipsoidal or sometimes narrowly clavate, initially hyaline but becoming dark chocolate brown at maturity, distinctly constricted at the ± median septum, smooth and very thick-walled, each cell with four pale longitudinal germ slits extending almost the length of the cell, covered with a thick hyaline gelatinous sheath.
Not formally assessed. There is only one probably-correct record of this species in FRDBI, others being misidentifications for Arecophila striatispora. However, the species is inconspicuous and probably under-recorded.
In GB&I, reported from dead stems of Elymus pungens, but known from a wide range of grass and Carex species in Europe.
In GB&I, reported from VC28 W Norfolk.