Plants 2--5 cm, yellowish green, stiff, evenly foliate, the perichaetia in comal tufts. Leaves 5--6 mm, erect patent when wet, appressed when dry, from oblong base gradually contracted to a long subula, ending in a straight, hyaline, serrate tip; alar cells hardly differentiated; basal laminal cells thin-walled, rectangular, hyaline; distal laminal cells chlorophyllose, oval to narrow or elongate oval, incrassate; costa filling 1/2--2/3 of leaf width, in transverse section showing adaxial hyalocysts as large as the median deuter cells, and abaxial groups of stereids, ribbed at back. Specialized asexual reproduction by deciduous buds produced in the distalmost part of the stem. Sporophytes not known from North America.

Soil in open pine, cedar and cypress forests; 80--200 m; Calif., Oreg.; Mexico; Asia (s India, Sri Lanka, Java, Celebes, Borneo, Taiwan); Africa (Madagascar, c Africa); Pacfic Islands (Hawaii); n Australia.

This species does not fruit in North America, where apparently only female plants exist. The range of this species is mainly se Asia. From there it extends south to Queensland, west to Madagascar and Central Africa, east to Hawaii, California, Oregon and Mexico. In California it is known from two localities, in Oregon from one, and in Mexico from one locality, which suggests that the occurrence of C. schmidii may result from occasional long distance dispersal events across the Pacific Ocean; it may not be native in North America. The first collection was made in California in 1933. Plants of C. schmidii resemble C. pilifer but are distinguished by elongate-oval rather than oval distal laminal cells and costa smooth at the abaxial surface and not with lamellae 3--4 cells high as in C. pilifer. Campylopus introflexus has lamellae 2 cells high and a similar areolation as C. pilifer but is distinguished in the field by reflexed hairpoints. All three species are more or less vicariant sister species, C. introflexus in the subantarctic to subtropical parts of the southern hemisphere, C. pilifer in tropical India, Africa and South America and from there extending to se North America and sw Europe, and C. schmidi mainly in se Asia.