LICHALP

Verrucula biatorinaria (Zehetl.) Nav.-Ros. & Cl. Roux

Syn.: Verrucaria biatorinaria Zehetl.

Lichenised.

Substrate:

Altitudinal range: from the montane belt (potential vegetation: deciduous forests dominated by Fagus sylvatica and closed coniferous forests with Picea abies) to the alpine belt (potential vegetation: treeless Alpine grasslands and tundras, to the lower limit of perennial snow and the equilibrium line of glaciers)

Note: a species with a thick, grey-brown thallus forming patches of up to 3 cm in diam. consisting of verrucose to subsquamulose areoles, and ellipsoid ascospores (to c. 15 µm long); a lichenicolous lichen on Caloplaca biatorina at high elevations; widespread in the Northern Hemisphere, including the Alps, but altogether rare; apparently somehow more frequent in the Southern and Western Alps.