02/09/2010 Heart O' the Hills Area, Olympic National Park, Washington
02/09/2010 Heart O' the Hills Area, Olympic National Park, Washington
06/24/2007 Heart O' the Hills Area, Olympic National Park, Washington
06/24/2003 Heart O' the Hills Area, Olympic National Park, Washington
03/13/2013 Heart O' the Hills Area, Olympic National Park, Washington
03/18/2013 Heart O' the Hills Area, Olympic National Park, Washington
03/24/2013 Heart O' the Hills Area, Olympic National Park, Washington
05/12/2013 Heart O' the Hills Area, Olympic National Park, Washington
Several similar lichens with cup-shaped tips are classified in the genus Cladonia. They are common at all elevations of the Northwest Coast. Pixie Cup lichens like acidic mineral soil, moss and humus. Rotting tree stumps are often festooned with Pixie Cup lichens mixed with many other lichens, mosses and fungi.
Like all lichens, Pixie Cups consist of a fungus species and a green algae species, and possibly a blue-green bacteria species.