Orange lichen UV fluorescence, from Green Point beach Tasmania

[JMC]

Been in Tasmania for January, enjoying the landscape and wildlife. While in the North West we stopped at a place called Green Point to go to the beach. Across most of Tasmania on the rocks is an orange lichen, so I got a sample from the rock (no hammers, the constant wave damage had provided some samples). This was about 3 cm across. The rock there is old, very old - about 1 billion years old.

 

Images are of the front and back of the sample, in visible light (sunlight, auto white balance), and 365nm UV induced fluorescence using a nemo torch (daylight white balance). Images just captured as jpg in the camera (Eos R7) and size reduced for sharing here.

 

Front side of the rock.

 

 

Back side of the rock.

 

 

The lichen fluoresces with a bright orange colour. The rock is mainly not strongly colour under UV, but some areas show a yellow colour.

 

Location of the beach (just to the west of Green Point campground).

 

 

 

 

[colinbm]

Nice examples Jonathan.
Did you identify the rock ?

[JMC]

20 minutes ago, colinbm said:

Nice examples Jonathan.
Did you identify the rock ?

Thanks Col, but no, I didn't identify it. It's the Rocky Cape group in that part of Tasmania, and according to here - https://asud.ga.gov.au/search-stratigraphic-units/results/27555 - that is described as "Quartz arenite-pelite association - predominantly shallow marine quartz siltstone, shale, cross-bedded quartzarenite and minor carbonate.". My guess would be quartz arenite based on that.

[colinbm]

Thanks Jonathan, It fluoresces nicely.

[Andrea B.]

Hi Jonathan. What a wonderful place to vacation for a month!! I recall that you have been there before and showed us a photo of an interesting animal (the name of which currently escapes me).

 

This is cool fluorescence. Thanks for the interesting specimens.

[JMC]

19 hours ago, Andrea B. said:

Hi Jonathan. What a wonderful place to vacation for a month!! I recall that you have been there before and showed us a photo of an interesting animal (the name of which currently escapes me).

 

This is cool fluorescence. Thanks for the interesting specimens.

Hi Andrea, This was our 5th visit to Tasmania I think, and it did not disappoint. Yes, the wildlife is amazing, and I am currently going through about 6000 photos from the month. When I get to it I'll put up a photo of the beach where the rock above came from, and perhaps some more of the interesting wildlife.

 

I was amazed by how strongly orange the lichen fluoresced. Perhaps even more surprising though was the localized yellow fluorescence in the rock itself.

[Andrea B.]

It is possible that the yellow fluorescence is from an animal's urine? 

 

6000 photos!! You are going to be busy for quite some time with that! I always find it difficult to cull photos and tend to give up and just buy another backup. <laughing>

[JMC]

11 hours ago, Andrea B. said:

It is possible that the yellow fluorescence is from an animal's urine? 

 

6000 photos!! You are going to be busy for quite some time with that! I always find it difficult to cull photos and tend to give up and just buy another backup. <laughing>

Yes, the photos will keep me occupied for a while. Urine could be a possibility, but this looked to be a relatively fresh break, and it was from a part of the beach that would get the tide coming over it. I may try washing it gently at some point and see what happens (if the yellow is removed).

[JMC]

17 hours ago, Andrea B. said:

It is possible that the yellow fluorescence is from an animal's urine? 

 

6000 photos!! You are going to be busy for quite some time with that! I always find it difficult to cull photos and tend to give up and just buy another backup. <laughing>

Here's a photo of the formation where the sample came from on the beach at Green Point.

[Andrea B.]

Lichens are the ultimate adapters, aren't they? You can find them everywhere. 

Interesting beach "upheaval".

[Adrian]

Great images! The lichen look like some sort of Xanthoria species though being on the other side of the world I am not at all sure!

[JMC]

16 hours ago, Adrian said:

Great images! The lichen look like some sort of Xanthoria species though being on the other side of the world I am not at all sure!

Cheers Adrian. Yeah, I'm not sure as to what the lichen is, but I did come across this paper which might given some details (The lichen family Hymeneliaceae in Tasmania, with the description of a new species.) - https://www.canbr.org.au/abrs/lichenlist/Hymenelia_KANUNNAH7.pdf

 

Perhaps fluorescence could be used to differentiate between species which look similar in the visible spectrum?