[Distorted Greek kodon, bell, and phoras, bearing, alluding to capsules with bell-shaped calyptrae]

Halina Bednarek-Ochyra, Ryszard Ochyra

Racomitrium subg. Cataractarum Vilhelm

Plants small, medium to large, mostly stiff and rigid, rarely pliant, robust to gracile, in green, yellow, olive, gray-green, brown to blackish mats. Stems creeping to ascending, repeatedly forked to sparsely fasciculately or pinnately branched, sometimes with short, tuft-like horizontal branchlets. Leaves lanceolate, ovate- or oblong-lanceolate, broadly ovate to broadly lingulate, elliptical to oblong-elliptical; margins 1-stratose to variously 2-stratose distally, mostly recurved on one or both sides, entire or erose-dentate to papillose-crenulate or crenate at apex; apices slenderly long-acuminate to rounded, rounded-obtuse to subacute, muticous or seldom with short to long awns, deeply concave to canaliculate-concave; costa single, reaching mid leaf to percurrent, entire or spurred and forked at tip, reniform to strongly flattened abaxially, 2-5-stratose in transverse section, situated in a shallow or deep, narrow- or wide-angled groove; laminal cells 1-stratose throughout to variously 2-stratose distally, elongate to linear throughout or isodiametric to shortly rectangular distally, with sinuose longitudinal walls becoming nodulose and porose with strongly incrassate walls in 2-3 rows at the base, mostly distinctly papillose with large, flat papillae covering longitudinal walls and major parts of the lumina leaving only a narrow groove in the center, occasionally more or less smooth. Perichaetial leaves differentiated, innermost elliptical to lingulate, hyaline throughout or chlorophyllose in the distal part. Seta dextrorse throughout or only with a single torsion to the right proximal to the urn and sinistrorse basally, erect, straight, smooth. Capsule brown, red-brown, or yellow-brown, straight, symmetric or nearly so, ovoid to long-cylindric; exothecial cells isodiametric to elongate, thick-walled; annulus 2-4-seriate; peristome teeth split to base or only to the middle into 2-3 terete, papillose branches. Calyptra distinctly verrucose to papillose distally. Spores spheric, finely papillose.

Species 15 (9 in the flora): North America, South America (Argentina, Chile, Colombia), Europe, arctic and temperate Asia, n Africa, Atlantic Islands (Azores, Canary Islands, Gough Island, Iceland, Madeira, South Georgia, Tristan da Cunha), Pacific Islands (Hawaiian Islands, Society Islands).

Codriophorus is primarily characterized by leaves that are distinctly papillose, with large flat papillae distributed on both abaxial and adaxial laminal surfaces, and over both the longitudinal walls and most of the lumina, leaving only a narrow slit in the middle. This disposition of the papillae gives a peculiar appearance to the transverse leaf sections. It consists of a regular pattern of distinct hollows over lumen centers separated by the large and equally thickened flat cuticular elevations over the walls and sides of the lumina. In addition, the calyptra is densely papillose towards the apex, the costa usually ends well before the leaf apex, and the seta is dextrorse (in species of subsect. Fasciformes twisted only once to the right proximally to the capsule and sinistrose basally). The peculiar papillosity of the laminal cells is known otherwise only in the genus Racomitrium. That genus is distinguished by a strongly papillose seta sinistrorse on drying, slightly ventricose capsule, and presence of strongly papillose, long-decurrent, and erose-dentate awns.

SELECTED REFERENCES

Bednarek-Ochyra, H. 2006. A Taxonomic Monograph of the Moss Genus Codriophorus P. Beauv. (Grimmiaceae). Cracow. Bednarek-Ochyra, H., D. Lamy, and R. Ochyra. 2001. A note on the moss genus Codriophorus P. Beauv. Cryptog. Bryol. Lichénol. 22: 105-111.