Thallus leprose-granulose, eventually subareolate from slightly green to dark brownish/grayish-brownish, arising from a white protothallus, soon disappearing.  Apothecia subinnate, disc naked, black-dark brownish/grayish brownish, initially convex, then flattened, margin thin, concolourous, soon disappearing.  Spores in very short, subclavate asci, 4-8, slender, acicular, obsolete, pleioblastic, diam. many times longer, hyaline.

On flooded stones (according to Fries also on wood and bark) rare in mountain streams:  on granite at Lomnitz Melzer coal mine (Fw.) and on gneiss in water on the bench Petzkeretscham in the valley (Kbr.).