Montana Field Guide

Plants: Acrocarpous, growing near each other without being crowded to sprinkled further apart, pale- or yellow-green. Stems from very short (0.2 cm) to tall (25 cm) (FNA 20007).

Leaves: Shriveled (Flowers 1973), twisted and bent when dry, upright to spreading when wet, lance-shaped with ovate tendencies (FNA 2007) or somewhat oblong and spathulate (Flowers 1973), the upper leaves 2-5 mm in length (FNA 2007); leaf edges flat (Crum & Anderson et al., 1981), dentate, occasionally almost entire above; costa extending to the leaf tip or rarely shortly beyond it (FNA 2007).

Leaf Cells: Upper laminal cells quadrangular to 6-sided (FNA 2007), occasionally swollen at the leaf edges for 1 or 2 rows, forming a vague border (Crum & Anderson et al., 1981); lower cells somewhat long and quadrangular (FNA 2007).

Fruit ripens late in autumn, over the winter, and into spring (FNA 2007).

Moist soil in disrupted habitats (FNA 2007) such as along roads, in mudflats, grazing land, channels, along streams (Crum & Anderson et al., 1981). Occurring in lowlands and reaching the highlands (FNA 2007).

Perigonia growing at the ends of lower and lateral branches, typically with club-shaped paraphyses intermingling (FNA 2007), or sometimes antheridia intermixed with archegonia in the perichaetium (Crum & Anderson et al., 1981). Perichaetia with thread-like paraphyses. Seta upright, 1-20 mm tall, carrying the capsule beyond the perichaetial bracts. Capsule 1-3 mm in length; neck short with stomata consisting of a small, narrow opening in a rounded guard cell; peristome lacking. Calyptra conical (FNA 2007).