New hosts for Choanatiara lunata

Choanatiara lunata is a coelomycetous fungus producing conidia with funnel-shaped appendages. The species was originally reported on fallen needles of Pinus resinosa and P. strobus in Ontario, Canada. Our systematic work on coelomycetes in Pinus spp. was carried out on 29 different pine hosts (species, varieties, forms or cultivars) at the arboretum of the Montreal Botanical Garden. Choanatiara lunata was isolated (on PDA, MA, CMA) from 9 (31%) of the pine hosts investigated. From those, four hosts are species indigenous to North America: P. albicaulis (subgenus Haploxylon), P. resinosa, P. ponderosa, and P. jeffreyi (subgenus Diploxylon). The other five hosts are pines exotic to North America. Three are indigenous to Europe: P. nigra 'Laricio', P. nigra 'Nigra', and P. nigra 'Pallasiana' (subgenus Diploxylon), and two are indigenous to East Asia: P. densiflora and P. tabulaeformis (subgenus Diploxylon). Except for P. resinosa, these are all new hosts for this fungus. The fungus was associated with symptoms of summer needle necrosis in the crown. For the first time, the cultural characteristics of the fungus are given, and the morphology of C. lunata described in this work was compared to the one reported by Nag Raj (1993).