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The overall physical similarity of some mosses and leafy liverworts means that confirmation of the identification of some groups can be performed with certainty only with the aid of microscopy or an experienced bryologist. Liverworts, like other bryophytes, have a gametophyte-dominant life cycle, with the sporophyte dependent on the gametophyte ...
An example of moss (Bryophyta) on the forest floor in Broken Bow, Oklahoma. Bryophytes (/ ˈ b r aɪ. ə ˌ f aɪ t s /) [2] are a group of land plants (embryophytes), sometimes treated as a taxonomic division, that contains three groups of non-vascular land plants: the liverworts, hornworts, and mosses (Bryophyta sensu lato). [3]
Some extinct orders of lycophytes fall into the same group as the extant orders. Different sources use varying numbers and names of the extinct orders. The following phylogram shows a likely relationship between some of the proposed Lycopodiopsida orders. [citation needed]
Many club-moss gametophytes are mycoheterotrophic and long-lived, residing underground for several years before emerging from the ground and progressing to the sporophyte stage. [4] Lycopodiaceae and spikemosses (Selaginella) are the only vascular plants with biflagellate sperm, an ancestral trait in land plants otherwise only seen in bryophytes.
The pseudo-elaters are multi-cellular, unlike the elaters of liverworts. They have helical thickenings that change shape in response to drying out; they twist and thereby help to disperse the spores. Hornwort spores are relatively large for bryophytes, measuring between 30 and 80 μm in diameter or more.
From a distance, Takakia looks like a typical layer of moss or green algae on the rock where it grows. On closer inspection, tiny shoots of Takakia grow from a turf of slender, creeping rhizomes . The green shoots which grow up from the turf are seldom taller than 1 cm, and bear an irregular arrangement of short, finger-like leaves (1 mm long).
Liverworts (Hepaticae) are non-vascular plants with a bryophyte life cycle in which the gametophyte is the dominant generation. The study of mosses and liverworts is called bryology . The main article for this category is Marchantiophyta .
The Bryopsida constitute the largest class of mosses, containing 95% of all moss species.It consists of approximately 11,500 species, common throughout the whole world. The group is distinguished by having spore capsules with teeth that are arthrodontous; the teeth are separate from each other and jointed at the base where they attach to the opening of the capsule. [2]