Hello all,

I was on a walk last Sunday in the Bronx, NYC where a friend of mine found a very interesting asco.  It has a black fertile surface.  The outer surface is scurfy and dark brown.  It is rather thin and papery, especially after drying. It was growing on deciduous wood.  Asci that I measured were 70-73 x 6.5-7.5µm.  Spores are hyaline, biguttulate, ellipsoid and 7-10.5 x 3-4µm.  Paraphyses are lanceolate, septate, they enlarge to about 4µm at the widest point.  Many of the heads of the paraphyses became detached.  I applied KOH and noticed that there was an exudate of dark red pigment.  It also appears to be bitunicate.  (Unfortunately I am having problems with my image capture equipment, so I don't have the best documentation of all of these features).  Is this Ionomidotis irregularis? 

Many thanks in advance for your help.

Ethan