MOSSES 



THE PARTS OF THE MOSS PLANT 



WE often hear people speak of moss as if there were 

 but one kind. Perhaps you will be surprised to learn 

 that over ten thousand kinds are already known. 



Some of them are slender and hairlike; others look 

 like small trees; a number of them resemble feathers. 

 All of them have roots, stems, and leaves, like other 

 plants. 



The roots are very delicate, yet they take as firm a 

 hold of the soil, in proportion to their size, as many 

 trees. They consist of small, threadlike fibers, or long, 

 creeping, underground stems, like the ferns except that 

 they are smaller. In most cases these serve only to 

 attach the plant to its growing place, for every part 

 of the moss takes in its own share of nourishment. 



Many of the mosses have long stems that branch and 

 branch again. Others have scarcely any stem. They 

 seem to send up from the root a mere tuft of leaves. 

 The stems are solid and are made up of many cells. 

 They have no woody fibers running through them as the 

 ferns and flowering plants have, so they cannot stand 

 up erect. These stems are of a reddish color, or of 

 green or brown. If you look at a moss stem carefully 

 you will find that the leaves grow around it on all sides. 



The leaves of mosses are the part that we notice first. 

 If you examine them with a microscope you will see 



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