Montana Field Guide

Plants: Acrocarpous. Growing in open clumps of erect shoots, deep green to brown, not shiny. Stems simple, 1-2 cm tall; rhizoids few and near the top (FNA 2007).

Leaves: Spreading to ca 45 degrees when moist (FNA 2007), not strongly curved to the side or only slightly (Lawton 1971) or rarely so (Crum & Anderson et al. 1981), slightly bent, wavy and curved when dry, lance-shaped, narrowing steadily to a subula, 2-4 mm in length; margins upright, smooth (FNA 2007), often finely saw-toothed apically (Lawton 1971); costa extending slightly beyond the apex (Crum & Anderson et al. 1981).

Leaf Cells: Margins sometimes with 2 cell layers above; alar cells steadily increasing in size; basal laminal cells somewhat long, smooth, porose; upper laminal cells nearly square to short-rectangular, with papillae on the abaxial face; costa with stereid cells scarcely different from the guide cells (FNA 2007).

K. blyttii differs from K. starkei with its spreading, deeper green to brownish leaves that are not shiny and smooth capsules. K. starkei usually has curved, green or yellow leaves, which are most often glossy, and conspicuously ribbed capsules when dry. They also differ in placement of the perigonia (FNA 2007).

K. falcata grows in more crowded patches than K. blyttii and has falcate leaves turned to one side (FNA 2007).

Soil in stone crevices or noncalcareous stone (FNA 2007), possibly always on noncalcareous substrates (Crum & Anderson et al. 1981); high elevations (FNA 2007).

Autoicous, the perigonia spaced much lower than the perichaetia or at the top of different branches (FNA 2007). Seta 4-8 mm tall (Lawton 1971), single. Capsule bowed and nearly vertical, not distinctly grooved when dry (FNA 2007) but may be creased (Lawton 1971); theca 1-1.2 mm in length; peristome with 16 2-lobed teeth, the lobes reaching to mid-tooth, russet, with papillae or longitudinal grooves or pores. Calyptra like a draping hood (FNA 2007).