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Kindbergia Ochyra, 1982.

The mosses in this section are plumosely branched pleurocarps with the branch axes somewhat arched above the substratum. The stem leaves are markedly broader and more spreading than the patent branch leaves. The stem leaves are usually very lightly plicate with the plicae restricted to the immediate base.
see key to Hylocomium

Key to Kindbergia

Species included are all in Brachytheciaceae:
Kindbergia oregana (Sullivant) Ochyra
Kindbergia praelonga (Hedwig) Ochyra

The genus Kindbergia is the product of one of many only partially successful attempts to break up a too-diverse genus, Eurhynchium. The genus is quite distinctive in all of North America but it blends almost imperceptibly into Eurhynchium in much of Eurasia. In western North America, the genus Kindbergia is easily recognized by the combination of planar or somewhat planar branching; leaves costate to near the apex; branch and stem leaf differentiation with the latter strongly reflexed from stem and markedly decurrent. Our two species are best differentiated by habitat preferences. Kindbergia oregana occupies mesic, shaded to partially shaded, often alluvial sites mostly on flat ground over leaf litter; K. praelonga occupies rather heavily shaded sites along streams, especially in splash zones.

A. Plant regularly plumose with a single main stem from which arises shorter, nearly unbranched, lateral stems; plant mainly of coastal moderately low elevation sites .....Kindbergia oregana
A. Plant irregularly branched or tri- to tetra-pinnate; plant mainly of higher elevation, or of deeply shaded sites .....Kindbergia praelonga

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