Leucodon
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Authority
Sharp, Aaron J., et al. 1994. The Moss Flora of Mexico. Part Two: Orthotrichales to Polytrichales. Mem. New York Bot. Gard. 69 (2)
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Family
Leucodontaceae
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Scientific Name
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Description
Genus Description - Coarse and often robust, rigid plants in dull, dark-green or yellow-brown, loose tufts. Secondary stems simple branched, usually terete, often stoloniform-tapered. Leaves erect or appressed to ± secund when dry, erect- to wide-spreading when moist, ovate or ovate-lanceolate, acute or acuminate, mostly phcate; margins plane to reflexed or revolute, entire or serrulate at the apex; costa lacking; cells smooth, thick-walled, shortly oblong- or linear-rhomboidal above, becoming longer toward the middle ofthe base, yellow at the insertion, rounded-quadrate and transversely oblong in many rows at the margins in the lower half or more. Dioicous. Perichaetial leaves very long-sheathing, acuminate; cells elongate throughout. Setae very short to elongate, smooth; capsules mostly exserted, erect and symmetric, smoothly oblong-cylindric, ovoid, or ellipsoidal, narrow-mouthed; annulus none; operculum conic or obliquely rostrate; peristome teeth inserted below the mouth, whitish, becoming pale-yellow with age, lanceolate, mostly perforate, papillose; endostome rudimentary or sometimes apparently lacking. Spores spherical or sometimes elhpsoidal. Calyptrae large, cucullate (but generally split only part way down, the base enveloping the tip of the seta until the capsule is mature), smooth or plicate at base, naked.