Description

 Life habit: lichenized; Thallus: foliose, continuous with margin rounded or lobate, 3-10 cm wide, loosely adnate; lobes: irregular, broadly elongate, marginally entire or crenulate, often folded; lobe tips usually subrotund to rotund, often ascending, eciliate but with numerous white hairs; upper surface: dark greenish black, covered with scattered, white hairs, epruinose; lacking soredia or isidia; upper cortex: multilayered, paraplectenchymatous, 10-30 micrometer thick; cortex: multilayered, paraplectenchymatous, 20-40 micrometer thick; medulla: white or yellow, loose hyphae, 40-260 micrometer thick; photobionts: primary one a cyanobacterium (Scytonema), secondary photobiont absent; lower surface: dark greenish black, glabrous, rhizinate; rhizines: fasciculate; cyphellae and pseudocyphellae absent; Ascomata: apothecial, up to 1.2 mm wide, sessile, laminal on the upper surface, orbicular, cup-shaped; margin: paraplectenchymatous; disc: reddish brown, flat; anatomy: exciple: hyaline or light brown, 20-30 micrometer thick, epithecium: brown or brownish yellow; hymenium: colorless, 60-90 micrometer tall; paraphyses: ± branched, septate, apically capitate; hypothecium: hyaline; asci: clavate, 8-spored; Conidiomata: pycnidial, marginal, semi-immersed, punctiform, ostiole dark; conidia: bacilliform, 9-16 x 1 micrometer; Spot tests: all negative; Secondary metabolites: none detected.; Habitat and ecology: on rocks and soil among mosses in moist habitats; World distribution: rare in northern Europe and western North America, especially in California; Sonoran distribution: scattered locations in Arizona, southern California and Baja California (Guadalupe Island).