Mastocarpus pacificus

Northern Turkish washcloth

Authority: (Kjellman) Perestenko

Thallus is a blade to 7 cm (2.8 in) tall and 1-15 mm (0.04 – 0.6 in) wide, subdichotomously to flabellately branched to three orders from an unbranched, terete stipe, uniformly reddish black; female thallus with papillae on both surfaces and margins or restricted to margins when fertile, male thalli without papillae.

Habitat

Intertidal rock, from bedrock to cobble; in the mid to upper intertidal zones usually restricted to tidepools.

North Pacific Distribution

Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands to Cook Inlet, Alaska; Japan; Russia

Former scientific names

Gigartina pacifica, Mammillaria pacifica, Gigartina unalaschcensis, Mastocarpus unalaschcensis, Gigartina ochotensis, Mastocarpus ochotensis