Plant Guide > Mosses and Lichens > Mosses > Genus Encalypta > Extinguisher Moss With Fringed Veils Moss

Extinguisher Moss With Fringed Veils Moss

The Extinguisher Mosses with Fringed Veils, Encalypta ciliata, Hedw.

Habit and habitat.-In loose bright or pale-green tufts on shaded rocks and soil; not rare.

Name.-The specific name ciliata, from the Latin cilium, an eyelash, refers to the fringed base of the veil.

Plant (gametophyte).-Stems 1/2 to 2 inches high, thick, covered with rooting filaments, simple or sparingly branched.

Leaves.-Soft, large, crowded, recurved-spreading, oblong, egg-shaped or tongue-shaped, slightly concave; apex short, taperpointed with a tiny sharp point; margin wavy; vein pale-yellow, vanishing below the apex or passing into it; cells, toward the base loose, red, the marginal of several rows narrower and paler.

Habit of flowering.-Male and female flowers on one plant (monoicous).

Veil (calyptra).-Straw-colour, descending far below the base of the spore-case, bordered at the base by lance-shaped solid white or orange segments.

Pedicel.-Long; yellow or pale-red.

Spore-case.-Cylindrical, smooth, slightly constricted under the mouth when dry, the neck short and indistinct.

Lid (operculum).-Conic, with a long slender beak.

Teeth (Peristome).-Rarely absent, single, of 16 narrowly lance-shaped red teeth, sometimes divided into two irregular segments, connivent when dry, incurved when moist.

Distribution.-Mountain regions of New England, the Rocky Mountains and the Pacific slope, Europe and Africa.