Sample # 12

Name: Thuidium abietinum

Family:Thuidiaceae

Collection Date:- 10-12-2011

Habitat:on a bark of tree

Location: Field Station

Description: Medium sized green plants, grow on soil

Collector: Getachew Hatsey

Key Used: Conard, H.S. and P.L. Redfearn, Jr. 1979. How to Know the Mosses and Liverworts 2nd Edition, McGraw-Hill, Boston, Mass.

1a. Plants with stems and leaves; leaves equally spaced around the stem or, if in two opposite rows, leaf cells enlongate or isodiametric and rhizoids multicellular; sporophyte persisting for weeks or months with no elaters present in the capsule. Class III MUSCL…2

2b. Plants not as above….3

3b. Plants not as above…(p.28) Subclass 3 Bryidae

Bryidae

1b. Green, brown, yellow, or blackish plant; if empty cells occur, they are not in two or three layers or they occur at the base, apex, or margin of leaf…..3

3b. Leaves inserted in three or more rows though plants sometimes strongly flatten thus appearing into rows….7

7b. Plants with peristome of more than four teeth or the peristome absent; gemmae when present at the tips of sterile stems not arrange in a cup…8

8b. Leaves well developed and persistant…9

9b. Capsule and leaves not as above….10

10b. Plants with or without a distinct stem; capsule when present with an operculum or regularly dehiscing near middle; may or may not be a ephemeral…17

17b. Plants minute to large; capsule immersed to exerted; if plants minute with immersed capsule, growing on rocks, trees or soil and not ephemeral…20

20b. Leaves without such out-growths; sometimes with deciduous gemmae….28

28b. Plants not having the above combinations of characters; peristome when present single or double, composed of teeth formed by strips of cell wall split apart through the cell cavity; growing on various substrates but not restricted to reach organic soil, bones, or other organic matter….33

33b. stems creeping and branched, archegonia, antheridia, and sporophyte lateral.......139

139a. leaves papillose, at least on the dorsal side and on the upper half of the leaf……………………….140

140b. papillae located over the cell-cavity; if located at the end of the cell not formed by projecting angle……..150

150b. Plants not conspicuously fern-like or dendroid……..152

152b. leaves not as above………..153

153b. Leaves with a single costa reaching the middle of the leaf or beyond in at least some leaves………….159

159b. plants not complanate……..160

160b. Capsule when present exserted beyond the perichaetial leaves; costa and leaf cells not as above………..161

161b. Papillae not forming a single row over the center of the cells…….163

163b. Papillae smaller, often several on one cell………..164

164b. Paraphyllia numerous, filamentous, mostly branched………………..172

172b. Paraphyllia not attached to leaves……..173

173a. Apical cell of branch leaves crowned with 2-4 papillae…….(p. 174) Thuidium

Thuidium

1b. Plants large with robust; leaf cells stoutly unipapillose………………4

4a. Stems 1-pinnate, suberect……. Thuidium abietinum

Thuidium abietinum

"Robust, rigid, dark green, yellowish, or dark brown plants, stems. Alaska to Nova Scotia, Newfoundland south to Arizona, Utah, Colorado." (Conrad and Redfearn, 1979)