Forum Flora Germanica

"Neuwirth & Aptroot (2011) have proposed a new taxonomy for G. scripta s.lat., recognizing four distinct taxa, G. betulina, G. macrocarpa, G. pulverulenta, and G. scripta s.str. However, a more recent study based on both molecular and morphological characters (Kraichak & al. 2015) showed that, although between six and seven putative species are nested within the complex, these do not fully correspond to the taxa that were recently distinguished based on apothecium morphology, and cannot be circumscribed with the morphological characters that were traditionally used in the classification of the complex. Any formal taxonomic treatment will require additional sampling and evaluation of additional traits that potentially can characterize these clades. Pending a revision of the Italian material, I treat here G. scripta in the broad sense, while the few recent records of the “species” delimited by Neuwirth & Aptroot (2011) are provisionally treated as separate entities."