Identification notes
This is a fairly frequent little liverwort in northern and western districts but is quite unfamiliar to many bryologists of dry, lowland areas. Its standout features are rather subtle, its stems with bilobed leaves looking rather Lophozia-like. Unsurprisingly, Sphenolobus now sits alongside Orthocaulis – which includes several former Lophozia species – within the Anastrophyllaceae family.
Though small, shoots of S. minutus can be very gemmiferous and the gemmae may be green, yellow, orange, red or purple-red, so it’s always a good idea to collect a few shoots to check its identity later on. Under the compound microscope, unequivocal identification is straightforward – examine a few stem leaves and you’ll spot the cells in the leaf lobes arranged in neatly concentric rows. This is a really good character but not an easy one to see with just a hand-lens.
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