Lepyrodon pseudolagurus
B.H.AllenMale plants almost as large as females or dwarfed (not in Victoria). Turves or cushions to 0.5 m or more in diameter on rocks and tree bases. Stems creeping, much-branched, red-brown, densely covered with ferrugineous rhizoids, with a weak central strand; branches ±erect, to c. 20 (–50) mm long; microphyllous branches with ecostate leaves c. 0.5–1 mm long occasionally present. Leaves erect-spreading to imbricate, ovate to broadly ovate, (2–) 3–4.5 mm long, 0.9–1.4 mm wide, strongly concave, rugose in apical half, otherwise smooth; apices acuminate, with a short or long hyaline, denticulate hair-point; costae single, bifurcate or spurred, extending 1/4–1/2 leaf length; margins serrulate in apical half or more, erect; laminal cells short-linear to linear, 54–130 μm long, 6–9 μm wide, smooth, becoming shorter toward the base; alar cells not differentiated. Setae 13–23 mm long, red-brown, smooth. Capsules oblong-cylindric, (1.5–) 1.8–2.8 mm long. Operculum oblique-rostrate from high conic base, 1–1.5 mm long. Exostome rudimentary, consisting of 16 short stumps, or absent (not in Victoria).
HSF, VAlp. Also NSW and Tas. New Zealand, Argentina, Chile and Campbell Island. In rocky areas in the alpine zone and among subalpine woodland from Mount Useful through to the Bogong High Plains.
Allen (1999) revised L. lagurus by segregating Australian and New Zealand plants as L. pseudolagurus from South American L. lagurus based on supposed differences in size, how well the stem central strand is developed, the number of cells in axillary hairs, the degree of immersion of stomata in the capsule and the presence or absence of a rudimentary exostome. Fife (2018) did not follow this treatment due to these differences being hard to observe and some specimens not complying with all of the character states that Allen (1999) would have predicted based on the geographic origins of the specimens. However, phylogenetic analyses of chloroplast and nuclear DNA sequences suggests some credit in recognising Australasian populations as a separate species given that L. pseudolagurus groups together with L. australis in the phylogeny rather than with L. lagurus (Blöcher 2004).
Allen, B.H. (1998). A revision of the moss genus Lepyrodon (Leucodontales, Lepyrodontaceae). Bryobrothera 5: 23–48.
Blöcher, R. (2004). Molecular Evolution, Phylogenetics and Biogeography in Southern Hemispheric Bryophytes with Special Focus on Chilean Taxa . Ph.D. thesis, Bonn.
Fife, A.J. (2018). Lepyrodontaceae, in Smissen, R.; Wilton, A.D. (ed.) Flora of New Zealand – Mosses. Fascicle 40. Manaaki Whenua Press, Lincoln.
