Gigaspermum
Autoicous or paroicous (not in Victoria). Asexual propagules absent. Plants scattered or forming loose turves on soil. Leaves orbicular basally, ovate toward stem apex, pale green or white, distant to imbricate, erect- or wide-spreading when moist, erect-spreading when dry; apex rounded and abruptly apiculate in basal leaves or long-acuminate in perichaetial leaves, sometimes with a hairpoint; costa absent; margins entire or faintly denticulate toward apex in perichaetial leaves; laminal cells subquadrate, rhomboid, hexagonal or rectangular. Capsule urceolate or globose, immersed, operculate. Calyptra minutely mitrate, smooth. Spores angular, granulose, greater than 70 µm diameter.
Two species, one around the Mediterranean Sea and the other in southern Africa, Madagascar, New Zealand and Australia (Herrnstadt et al. 1980); one species in Victoria.
SpinningHerrnstadt, I.; Heyn, C.C.; Crosby, M.R. (1980). New data on the moss genus Gigaspermum. The Bryologist 83: 536–541.
