I’m not sure which catagory this topic belongs in s I apologize if it is in the wrong section.
I have semi-recently started on a path, journey, project, whatever you want to call it of trying to ID further the Lichens. I have a decent science background but lichens are challenging me more than anticipated. I’ve been looking for some resources or guides to help me with the basic filtering of the lichens. I know that there are frequent exceptions but I’m hoping to learn the general rules.
I read through this topic here about the resources (its an old topic on this forum) but does anyone have more accessable field guide type ID resources? I’m not hoping to get all the way down to species but I would love to occasionally be able to get past subphylum or at least know what is needed for the next ID level.
That’s great to hear - lichens are super cool and diverse! You seem to hail from the NM region? From your description, I think I might recommend this helpful guide to the lichens of nearby Oklahoma: https://a.co/d/i9gbgjI
I’m sure other folks will have other general resources to suggest. Please also feel free to contact me offline by email or iNat message if you’d like. Best, Ken
I’m in Ontario and regularly work in parts of the province with a lot of showy fruticose lichens, plus there’s not much other than lichens to look at in the winter here, so I got one of the recommended field guides for the area. I found the keys in it unhelpful for a beginner though.
Step 1 in the overall key is whether the mycobiont is a basidiomycete or an ascomycete. Step 3 is whether the photobiont is a cyanobacteria or an alga. I couldn’t find anywhere in the introduction explaining how I tell those things if I’m starting with no idea what the lichen in front of me is. There are later steps in the secondary keys or genus keys which require chemical tests or microscopy which I’ll deal with when I get there, but I feel like I’m doing something wrong if I can’t even follow the first couple steps… Are these normal steps for categorizing lichens?
I forgot to say, I’m in the state of New Mexico. Important information when it comes to IDing these little buggers.
As far as the first steps, I don’t really know where to begin other than what is the medium and general growth pattern. I know for a lot of them it does get down to chemical tests. I hope one day I’ll be that knowledgable about them but that is a long ways away.
For your purpose, I imagine it’s too far away to make it useful, but in Italy we have an amazing resource: ITALIC 8.0, the information system on italian lichens . Maybe for broad family or even genus IDing it could provide some general information?
You seem to hail from the NM region? From your description, I think I might recommend this helpful guide to the lichens of nearby Oklahoma: