Timmia norvegica

Detailed description

Plants 10-800 mm tall, erect, in compact or loose tufts, brown below, green or yellowish-green above. Stems unbranched or sparsely branched, red-brown 0.6-0.7 mm wide. Rhizoids arising all along stem, from leaves and costa, dark red-black c.15-35 µm wide, coarsely papillose. Leaves crisped or imbricate when dry, erecto-patent when wet, 2.5-12.0 × 0.8-1.1 mm, broadly lanceolate, apex acute to acuminate, with a well differentiated sheath, costa strong, uppermost leaves often longer than those lower on stem with less obvious sheath; leaf limb margin coarsely dentate in upper 1/3-1/2, slightly toothed, crenulate or ± entire in lower part. Dioicous. Perichaetia terminal, with stem continuing growth through a side branch arising just below Perichaetium. Perichaetial leaves long, tapering 7.5-9.0 × 1.0-1.5 mm, costa strong; margin distinct. Archegonia 5 or less per Perichaetium, 1.5-2.0 mm long; paraphyses absent or few, long and filamentous. Setae single, erect, 15-20 mm long, smooth, yellow-orange, brownish when old, twisted weakly to the right when dry. Capsules brownish, oblong-oval, horizontal to weakly pendulous, 2.5-3.0 × 1.5 mm long, non-plicate, weakly, neck scarcely evident; opercula hemispheric; annulus large and revoluble, of 3-4 rows of inflated cells c.0.5 mm wide when inflated; capsule mouth orange, with smaller cells; exostome teeth 16, yellow at base, pale yellow above, tapering from the base 0.8-1.0 × 0.2-0.3 mm, outer surface finely papillose-striate below, coarsely papillose and vertically barred above, in the upper half with a distinct row of central perforations, the inner surface with 45-55 lamellae which in the lower half of teeth are united by cross bars; endostome basal membrane yellow, 0.3-0.4 mm tall, the outer membrane cross –striolate; endostome cilia yellow, irregularly anastomosing 0.40-0.55 mm long, nodose, with 8-11 internodes, with tall papillae on the outer surface, the inner surface of the internodes with numerous short blunt appendiculations. Spores 17-20 µm diameter, brown, round or oval, finely papillose.