112 American Midland Naturalist Monograph No. 6 



lax, thin willed, ratlier irregular rectangular, two to six times as long as wide, 

 narrower along the margin : seta pale yellowish, somewhat translucent, about 4-8 

 mm long in our specimens and exceeding the leaves, abruptly tapering above 

 into a pale yellowish hypophysis with a dark brownish center; hypophysis when 

 moist about 0.7-0.9 mm long, smooth, pyriform-oval, when dry shrunken and 

 deeply wrinkled and corrugated: capsule when moist about as long as the 

 hypophysis, narrowly cylindric-oval, about twice as high as thick, when dry 

 much constricted in the middle, reddish purple towards the rim; peristome 

 teeth 16 (32 divisions), adhering in 8 groups which, when mature and dry are 

 abruptly reflexed and occa-^ionally split apart into 16 teeth, each of the eight 

 groups triangular, blunt, about twice as high as wide at the base; operculum 

 low-hemisperic, distinctly bluntly apiculate; calyptra narrowly conical; spores 

 smooth, thin-walled, globose to ellipsoid, about .007-. 009 mm in diameter. 

 Usually occurring on animal droppings and heretofore reported as ranging 

 from the Catskills to Minnesota and the Rockies, north to Newfoundland, 

 Athabasca, and British Columbia. 



Somerset Co.: Open sphagnum bog, near Mt. Davis, at an altitude of Z'lOO ft., 

 O. E. Jennings, Aug. 21, 1936; and July 15, 1949, Charles M. Boardman (figured). In 

 one case the plants were intermingled in the same tuft with Splachnum ampulldceum. 



This station marks an extension of more than 250 miles south of the pre- 

 viously known range but *"he plants were here in company with other northern 

 bog plants such as Menyanthes which is here also at its southernmost frontier. 

 The leaves are somewhat less serrulate than is generally described for T. angus- 

 tatus, the spores slightly smaller, and the fallen capsules which were shaken 

 out of the tufts scarcely appeared to be capable of entirely covering the 

 capsule. Otherwise the specimens seem typical. 



Family 10. DiSCELIACEAE 



Dioicous; gregarious, annual, with persistent protonema: stem very short 

 with gemmiform foliation; inner leaves largest, ovate to lance-oblong, obtuse 

 to acute, with plane margins, entire or irregularly crenulate at apex, faintly 

 costate towards apex; cells irregularly loosely rhomboid-hexagonal, thin-walled, 

 somewhat pellucid, elongated below, smooth, very sparsely chlorophyllose: seta 

 elongate, 2-3 cm, stiff, slender, pellucid, red or castaneous, sinistrorsely twisted; 

 capsule minute, cernuous or horizontal, globose-ovate, smooth, with a very 

 short collum; annulus of one (or two) series of cells, falling away in pieces; 

 peristome inserted below the mouth, simple; teeth lanceolate, acute, red, the 

 lower half usually perforate or split, the exterior usually vertically striate but 

 with no median line, not papillose, the interior with papillae and projecting 

 trabeculae: spores medium size; operculum reddish or orange, large, convex, 

 umbonate; calyptra split down on one side and usually remaining attached to 

 the seta by the constricted base. 



A peculiar family consisting of but one genus with only the following 

 species. Occurring on bare soil in northern Europe, Asia, and, in North 

 America, in Illinois, Ohio, eastern Pennsylvania, and New Jersey. 



