Abstract Detail

Bryological and Lichenological Section/ABLS

Stotler, Raymond E. [1], Crandall-Stotler, Barbara J. [1], Doyle, William T. [2].

Anthoceros phymatodes M. Howe (Anthocerotophyta) is a Heterotypic Synonym of Phaeoceros bulbiculosis (Brot.) Prosk.

Anthoceros phymatodes M. Howe was named by Marshall Howe in 1898 based upon vegetative plants that he had collected in northern California. The unique feature that he attributed to these plants was the production of stalked ventral tubers from the mid-portion of the thallus. These are initiated at the plant apex and become displaced posteriorly as they mature. It is exceptional that the only extant holotype material consists of serial microtome sections on 6 microscope slides. Anthoceros phymatodes received no attention for nearly 50 years until Frye and Clark supplemented the Howe treatment with the inclusion of sporophyte and spore/pseudoelater drawings from material collected in Mexico. Shortly after this, Proskauer regarded A. phymatodes as a synonym of Phaeroceros hallii (Austin) Prosk., a reduction maintained by Hässel de Menéndez in the late 1980s. Hasagawa, contemporaneously, however, placed A. phymatodes in synonymy of Phaeoceros laevis (L.) Prosk. Our study of the type material of the above taxa and of A. bulbiculosus Brot. (=P. bulbiculosus (Brot.) Prosk.) has shown beyond a doubt that the Howe species is actually conspecific with P. bulbiculosus.

1 - Southern Illinois University, Department of Plant Biology, 1125 Lincoln Drive, Carbondale, Illinois, 62901-6509, USA
2 - University of California, Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Earth & Marine Sciences Bldg., Santa Cruz, California, 95064, USA

Keywords:
hornworts
California
Anthoceros
Phaeoceros
A. bulbiculosus
A. phymatodes
P. hallii
P. laevis.

Presentation Type: Paper
Session: 23-3
Location: Ballroom 3 (Cliff Lodge)
Date: Monday, August 2nd, 2004
Time: 3:30 PM
Abstract ID:678