Colletotrichum species with curved conidia from herbaceous hosts

Colletotrichum (Glomerellaceae, Sordariomycetes) species with dark setae and curved conidia are known as anthracnose pathogens of a number of economically important hosts and are often identified as C. dematium. Colletotrichum dematium has been synonymised with many species, including the type of the genus, C. lineola. Since there is no living strain of the original material of either species available, we re-collected C. lineola from the original location to serve as an epitype of that name, and chose an appropriate epitype specimen and associated strain of C. dematium from the CBS collection. A multilocus molecular phylogenetic analysis (ITS, ACT, Tub2, CHS-1, GAPDH, HIS3) of 97 isolates of C. lineola, C. dematium and other Colletotrichum species with curved conidia from herbaceous hosts resulted in 20 clades, with 12 clades containing strains that had previously been identified as C. dematium. The epitype strains of C. lineola and C. dematium reside in two closely related clades. Other clades represent four previously undescribed species, C. anthrisci, C. liriopes, C. rusci and C. verruculosum, isolated respectively from Anthriscus in the Netherlands, Liriope in Mexico, Ruscus in Italy and Crotalaria in Zimbabwe. The new combinations C. spaethianum and C. tofieldiae are made. Colletotrichum truncatum is epitypified, as well as C. circinans, C. curcumae and C. fructi. Three further unidentified Colletotrichum taxa were detected in the phylogenetic analysis, which may require description after further research. Each species is comprehensively described and illustrated