Hylocomium splendens
Common names
moss
Biostatus
Native
Current conservation status
This is the first complete assessment of all known species of mosses found in the wild in Aotearoa New Zealand with a total of 560 species being assessed. The conservation status of mosses, published in the NZTCS database, replaces all previous assessments of mosses. Data supporting the 2025 NZTCS assessment of mosses has been published on the NZTCS database at https://nztcs.org.nz/reports/1155.
Source: NZTCS and licensed by DOC for reuse under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence.
2025 | At Risk – Uncommon | Qualifiers: DPS, DPT, SO
Category
Non-vascular
Structural class
Mosses
Detailed description
Robust matted, glossy yellow-brown or yellow-green moss (older stems and foliage distinctly darker coloured). Stems c.120 mm long, procumbent, stout, flexuose, younger parts dark red, clothed with branched paraphyllia, sometimes divided, regularly and densely bipinnate (or with branches simple and others pinnate); branches complanate, short, up to 10 mm long, slender, curved, terete and pointed. Stem leaves 1.75-2.00 mm long, erect and appressed both dry and moist, from a wide insertion; lamina broadly ovate-oblong, apiculate, with a usually short blunt point, slightly plicate below, concave; margins slightly recurved below, finely denticulate in the upper half; nerve double, sometimes reaching mid-leaf. Cells 40-50 microns long and 6 -8 x 1, narrowly linear, slightly sinuose, achlorophyllous, smooth; those at the base dark orange, shorter, wider, incrassate, not forming differentiated angle cells. Branch-leaves distinctly smaller, imbricated, to 1 mm long, elliptic-oblong, concave, not or slightly apiculate. Sex organs and sporophyte unknown in New Zealand.
Distribution
Indigenous. Worldwide (Northern Hemisphere certainly), New Zealand, North Island, main axial ranges (Raukumara, Kaweka, Ruahine and Tararua Ranges)
Substrate details
Terricolous on damp ground or water staturated peat amongst grasses and shrubs in montane to alpine situations
Threats
Not Threatened. An apparently widespread but biologically sparse species of montane to alpine habitats in this country.
Detailed taxonomy
Genus
Family
Endemic taxon
No
Endemic genus
No
Endemic family
No
Ecology
Fruiting
Fruits not known
Other information
Etymology
splendens: Splendid
NVS code
The National Vegetation Survey (NVS) Databank is a physical archive and electronic databank containing records of over 94,000 vegetation survey plots - including data from over 19,000 permanent plots. NVS maintains a standard set of species code abbreviations that correspond to standard scientific plant names from the Ngä Tipu o Aotearoa - New Zealand Plants database.
HYLSPL
Previous conservation statuses
This is the first complete assessment of all known species of mosses found in the wild in Aotearoa New Zealand with a total of 560 species being assessed. The conservation status of mosses, published in the NZTCS database, replaces all previous assessments of mosses. Data supporting the 2025 NZTCS assessment of mosses has been published on the NZTCS database at https://nztcs.org.nz/reports/1155.
Source: NZTCS and licensed by DOC for reuse under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence.
2014 | At Risk – Naturally Uncommon | Qualifiers: RR, SO
2010 | At Risk – Naturally Uncommon | Qualifiers: RR, SO
2005 | Sparse | Qualifiers: DP