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Genus Sphaerangium

Genus SphaerangiumThe Species of the Genus Sphaerangium are minute bud-like plants with spore-case immersed, without stems, growing on the ground in clusters, but with no protonema at the base. The lower leaves are small, while the upper are large, somewhat twisted and overlapping as shingles. They are concave or keeled and covered with minute protuberances on the back or on both surfaces. The spore-cases are spherical and for this reason Wilhelm Philipp Schimper gave them their generic name Sphaerangium, from the Greek; a ball, and; a vessel. The cases with their tiny erect veils are borne on pedicels and are enclosed in the leaves at their base; when mature they split irregularly and transversely for the emission of the spores, which are small, somewhat globular, minutely granulous and brown.

There are fourteen species known in all, four of them in North America.

Sphaerangium Muticum Moss