Whip Broom Moss

Dicranum flagellare Hedw. Descr. 3: 1. 1791
Dicranum miquelonense Ren. & Card. Bot. Gaz. 14: 93. 1889. Dicranum miquelonense crispatulum Roll, Hedwigia 36: 42. 1897. Dicranum crispatulum Kindb. Eur. & N. Am. Bryin. 189. 1897.
Dioicous: fertile plants in compact, dark-green to pale yellowish-green tufts, with more or less abundant, deciduous, flagellate branches from the axils of the upper leaves, bearing minute, appressed, scale-like leaves: stem-leaves variable, 3-4 mm. long, usually curved and somewhat spreading all round or sometimes crispate or falca te-secund, l anceolate, subtubulose above, slightly serrulate on the margin and more or less rough on the back in the upper part, with a broadly acute of slightly obtuse apex; costa not quite percurrent, just above the broadened base about one fourth the width of the leaf -blade, in cross-section below showing 6-8 guide-cells with about 2 rows of smaller cells above and below scarcely or not forming stereid-
r-
bands; alar cells usually brownish, scarcely extending to the costa, the cells above all with uniformly slightly thickened, not pitted walls; lower leaf-cells rectangular, 2-8 times as long as wide, the upper ones shorter, from square to 2-3 times as long as wide; inner perichaetial leaves about the length of the stem-leaves, costate, from a convolute base abruptly, often truncately or retusely, narrowed to a smooth point about one third the broader part in length, the margin just below the base of the point crenulate or denticulate: seta finally reddish, about 1.5 cm. long: capsule cylindric, erect, straight or nearly so, up to 3 mm. long, slightly ribbed when dry; annulus of two rows of cells; lid with its beak nearly two thirds as long as the capsule; peristome-teeth divided more than three fourths down, red and vertically striate one half up, the very slender forks pale and papillose above: spores slightly rough, about 16 fi in diameter.
Type locality: Germany.
Distribution: Newfoundland to British Columbia, Montana, and South Carolina; also in