Largeleaf Sphagnum

Sphagnum macrophyllum Bernh.; Brid. Bryol
Univ. 1: 10. 1826.
Sphagnum cribrosum Lindb. Hvitm. 74. 1882.
Sphagnum floridanum Card. Bull. Soc. Bot. Belg. 26": 60. 1887.
Plants more or less robust, brownish when dry or silvery-white. Wood-cylinder very hard, yellowish-green to brownish; cortical cells of the stem in 2-3 layers, rather large with thin walls, the outer cells quadrilateral, considerably longer than wide, without fibrils or pores: stem-leaves small. Ungulate-triangular, slightly concave, rounded at the apex, the border indistinct, narrow; hyaline cells rhomboidal, slightly longer and narrower toward the sides and base, without fibrils, rarely divided, the membrane on the outer surface intact with longitudinal membrane-pleats in the apical and central cells, on the inner surface with rather large round pores, if single, central, if more than one, in a row, 1-4 per cell: branches most commonly in fascicles of 2, both spreading, one frequently much stronger, generally both deflexed, their cortical cells in 1-3 layers, homogeneous, their mass abruptly thickened just above the leaf-insertion, but without retort-cells or such if present much reduced and inconspicuous, without fibrils or pores: branch-leaves aggregated in a tuft, lax, long linear-lanceolate, involute-tubulose toward the toothed apex, the border entire, of 2-3 rows of narrow cells; hyaline cells without fibrils, linear-sinuate, very long and narrow, 15-30 or more times as long as wide, on the inner surface mostly without pores, on the outer surface with larger or smaller round pores in a single row midway of the cell, or the row doubled in the central part or throughout, rarely 3 rows in the central part, 5-60 and upwards per cell: chlorophyl-cells rectangular in section, exposed equally or nearly so on both surfaces, the lumen elliptic; walls of the hyaline cells not convex on the inner surface, slightly so on the outer, one sixth to one fifth of the diameter of the cell.
Dioicous. Fruiting branches spreading or erect; perichaetial leaves large, ovate, concave, toothed across the blunt apex, bordered by 3-4 rows of narrow cells, otherwise of both kinds of cells throughout, the hyaline ones without fibrils, their membrane on the outer surface with round pores, usually one in either end or in the apical region several in a single row, on the inner surface with a few similar end-pores, almost exclusively in the cells of the basal part: capsule dark-brown: spores yellow, 25-30 ;u in diameter, slightly granular-roughened.
Type locality: Near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Distribution: Maine to Florida and Louisiana.