Pseudoscleropodium
Dioicous. Mats on soil. Stems creeping or ascending, regularly to irregularly pinnately branched, with mostly straight branches, glabrous or with fascicles of rhizoids; paraphyllia absent; central strand present. Branch leaves smaller and narrower than stem leaves, otherwise not differentiated, broadly ovate, oblong-ovate or obovate, erect when moist or dry, imbricate, arranged around stem and facing all directions, strongly concave, often plicate when dry; apex obtuse or rounded and apiculate, reflexed or straight; costa simple, extending 1/2–2/3 of leaf length, not ending in a spine; margin entire or denticulate toward apex, plane to incurved near apex, sometimes narrowly recurved near base; laminal cells linear, smooth; alar cells differentiated, quadrate to rectangular, slightly inflated, forming a poorly delimited small triangular or broadly ovate group extending to ¼ of the way to costa. Seta smooth. Capsule inclined to pendent, curved, obloid or short-cylindric, with an annulus. Calyptra cucullate, smooth, glabrous. Operculum conic. Peristome double; endostome segments similar height as exostome, with high basal membrane; cilia present.
One species native to Europe, but widely naturalised throughout the world e.g. North America, Jamaica, Hawaii, Argentina and Chile, St Helena, Réunion, Sri Lanka, Japan, Taiwan, New Zealand and south-east Australia (Allen & Crosby 1987).
Allen, B.H.; Crosby, M.R. (1987). Pseudoscleropodium purum re-established in South America. Journal of Bryology 14: 523–525.