Crustose lichen, forming striking, beautiful, greenish, lobate rosettes (sometimes confluent with nearby thalli) on most kinds of rock. At first closely-appressed, but in age the center buckles out and often comes off the rock completely. Abundant brownish to yellowish to orangish to greenish apothecia (often variably colored on the same thallus) packed tightly in the center. Lobe tips are somewhat thickened around the edge making them look a bit concave. Typically waxy in appearance, although it can be pruinose esp. near the tips. Though technically crustose, they often form a rudimentary lower cortex near the lobe tips, making them “honorary foliose” lichens.
One of the few (of many many) Lecanora that can be more-or-less reliably identified in the field. It is, however, a rather variable species, with several subspecies and varieties defined throughout the world. It can be non-pruinose or heavily pruinose, gray or greenish or yellowish, abundantly fertile or sparsely so, with strongly radiating or randomly overlapping lobes, and has light-colored but extremely variably-colored apothecia.
