B. Longitudinal section of the sporogonium borne on the pseudopodium (ps); c, calyptra; ar, neck of archegonium; sg′, foot; sg, capsule.
C. S. squarrosum. Ripe sporogonium raised on the pseudopodium (qs) above the enclosing leaves (ch); c, the ruptured calyptra; sg, capsule; d, operculum.
Sphagnales.—The single genus Sphagnum occupies a very distinct and isolated position among mosses. The numerous species, which are familiar as the bog-mosses, are so similar that minute structural characters have to be relied on in their identification. The plants occur in large patches of a pale green or reddish colour on moors, and, when filling up small lakes or pools, may attain a length of some feet. Their growth has played a large part in the formation of peat. The species are distributed in temperate and arctic climates, but in the tropics only occur at high levels. The protonema forms a flat, lobed, thalloid structure attached to the soil by rhizoids, and the plants arise from marginal cells. The main shoot bears numerous branches which appear to stand in whorls; some of them bend down and become applied to the surface of the main axis. The structure of the stem and leaves is peculiar. The former shows on cross-section a thin-walled central tissue surrounded by a zone of thick-walled cells. Outside this come one to five layers of large clear cells, which when mature are dead and empty; their walls are strengthened with a spiral thickening and perforated with round pores. They serve to absorb and conduct water by capillarity. The leaves have no midrib and similar empty cells occur regularly among the narrow chlorophyll-containing cells, which thus appear as a green network. The antheridia are globular and have long stalks. They stand by the side of leaves of special club-shaped branches. The archegonial groups occupy the apices of short branches (fig. 13, A.). The mature sporogonium consists of a wide foot separated by a constriction from the globular capsule (B). There is no distinct seta, but the capsule is raised on a leafless outgrowth of the end of the branch called a pseudopodium (C, qs). The capsule, the wall of which bears rudimentary stomata, has a small operculum but no peristome. There is a short, wide columella, over which the dome-shaped spore-sac extends, and no air-space is present between the spore-sac and the wall. In the embryo a number of tiers of cells are first formed. The lower tiers
form the foot, while in the upper part the first divisions mark off the columella, around which the archesporium, derived from the amphithecium, extends. The sporogonium when nearly mature bursts the calyptra irregularly. The capsule opens explosively in dry weather, the operculum and spores being thrown to a distance. The spore on germination forms a short filament which soon broadens out into the thalloid protonema. Some twelve species of Sphagnum are found in Britain.
Fig. 14.—Andreaea petrophila. Plant bearing opened capsule.
(k) ps, Pseudopodium.
c, Calyptra.
spf, Foot of sporogonium.
From Strasburger's Textbook of Botany