CONFERVA muscicola.
Ru sty Moss Conferva.
CRYPTOGAMIA Algee. '
Gen. Char. Seeds produced in ro u n d , solitary, closed
tubercles, projecting from th e f ro n d , b u t united
with it.
Spec. Char. R u s ty b rown . Filaments upright,
crowded, much, an d irregularly b ranched. Joints
even, twice as broad as they are long.
M r . LYELL, the discoverer of Conferva lichenicola, t . 1609,
has also detected this new species, growing on Orthotrichum
Striatum, on trees in the New Forest, Hampshire. We were,
at first sight, much inclined to suppose it some uncommon
luxuriance of the radical fibres, so conspicuous on the stems
of many mosses; but, as Mr. Sowerby has ascertained it to
proceed from the very disk of the leaf, we can no longer doubt
its being a new parasitical Conferva.
It forms very copious and dense tufts, of a dark rusty brown.
The stems are 2 or 3 lines high, erect, much and irregularly
branched, crooked, divaricated, of equal thickness throughout,
glossy like human hair under a microscope; the branches ascending,
obtuse, frequently pointing one way. The joints
are very short, not swelling, often scarcely visible on account
of their opacity.
Tufts of a somewhat similar production, but short and simple,
are often found on the same kind of Orthotrichum, whose
nature we are unacquainted with. Can they be an early state
of this Conferva ?