Nash, T.H., Ryan, B.D., Gries, C., Bungartz, F., (eds.) 2007. Lichen Flora of the Greater Sonoran Desert Region. Vol 3.

Thallus: determinate, irregularly rimose, often forming large patches, thin (0.05-0.20 mm), becoming subgelatinous when wetted, with a thin, black basal layer or (partly) lacking, with or without a pale, narrow prothallus surface: pale to dark brown, orange-brown or brownish green, smooth anatomy: paraplectenchymatous throughout, with a dark pigmented uppermost cell layer; algal cells: 5-10 µm in diam., in vertical columns or irregularly distributed throughout the thallus Perithecia: almost entirely immersed in thallus, lying beneath the plane or ±bulging surface or in thalline warts with only the apex visible as black spot from above; exciple: 0.2-0.4 mm wide, colorless to brownish; involucrellum: reaching down to exciple-base level, contiguous with the exciple or somewhat extending beyond it with lower inner parts paler, slightly broadening towards base, of "Zellnetztyp"; periphyses 20-25 µm long, thin, partly furcate asci: clavate, 8-spored ascospores: hyaline, simple, ellipsoid, 18-25 x 9-11 µm, sometimes with a thin perispore Pycnidia: unknown Spot tests: all negative Secondary metabolites: none detected. Substrate and ecology: epilithic, on largely or permanently submerged siliceous rocks, upland World distribution: widespread in western Eurasia and North America Sonoran distribution: Arizona and Sonora. Notes: The separation of Verrucaria funckii from V. elaeomelaena (A. Massal.) Arnold is mainly substrate-based, the latter being strictly calcicolous. In addition to the ecological difference, V. elaeomelaena differs also in having larger, especially broader, spores.