Ramalina menziesii

The lace lichen hung only inches from my eyes. So close that each eye seemed to be seeing a different part of the plant. Its yellowish-green leaves draped like long hair strands, although the middle ones were more like wide-egg noodles. Technically, these aren’t leaves but thalli. The Oxford Dictionary defines a thallus as “a plant body that is not differentiated into stem and leaves and lacks true roots and a vascular system.” Ramalina menziesii is a lichen, a symbiotic partnership between a fungus and an alga.

It was 29 degrees when I left my Seattle home this January morning. A light breeze went through the trees at Deception Pass State Park, and shivers ran through my body. The sun was popping through thin cirrus clouds, and by noon, it might even warm to the low forties. Winters in the Pacific Northwest have been endless and often dreary for me. I’d come to marvel at these lichens and absorb some of their vigor. The new year has just started, and I hoped these lichens would give me something. The Puget Sound lowlands are full of life in winter, and one doesn’t have to search too hard to discover its vibrancy.

This species, also known as fishnet lichen, thrives in the coastal fog zone of the Pacific Northwest. The Douglas fir that hosted my specimen rose 75 feet into the sky and was covered in these lichens. This tree’s colony is the most impressive collection of Ramalina menziesii that I know of in the Seattle area. Through the shrubs, also hosting this lichen, the waters of Puget Sound lapped lazily against Rosario Head and beyond stretched the Straits of Juan de Fuca. Salt taste filled the air, and any fog would bathe these epiphytes.

We have a new President who doesn’t speak well for the environment. During his first week in office, he began rolling back environmental protections. We need more people to care for nature and argue that it helps us all. Florence Williams, in “The Nature Fix,” summarizes, “Why nature makes us happier, healthier, and more creative. And Dachner Keltner, in “Awe: the New Science of Everyday Wonder and How it Can Transform Your Life,” shows how a little exposure to nature brings great rewards. I hope these lichens will give me the strength to show others how nature provides wonder and awe. Might this lichen and I find mutual benefits?

Mutualism is “a biological relationship where two or more species benefit from each other,” according to an undergraduate ecology class fifty years ago. The yellow-green structure in front of me is a fungus. In between the fungus cells are green algae cells. Most fishnet lichens host Trebouxia decolorans as their photobiont. The algae capture the sun’s energy, turning into sugars, while the fungus provides a home for the algae and helps bring in water and air. Interestingly, the algae can live by itself, but the fungus must have the algae to survive. It’d be fun to see a microscopic enlargement of that partnership. 

The Kawaiisu people of California reportedly used this species for its magical properties. I took two steps backward to stare up and down at this colony. These Ramalina menziesii have shared their magic with me. My body seemed warmer now; maybe some of that sun’s energy had filled my arteries.

I turned to hike onto Rosario Head; each step had more vigor than expected. What else might radiate vibrancy in this wildland?