Braunia imberbis (Sm.) N.Dalton & D.G.Long

Brinda, John C., He, Si, Atwood, John J., Magill, Robert E. & Reeb, Catherine, 2021, Notes on the bryophytes of Madagascar 5: new records from old collections, Cryptogamie, Bryologie 20 (15), pp. 205-211 : 208

Braunia imberbis (Sm.) N.Dalton & D.G.Long

SPECIMENS EXAMINED. — Madagascar. Antananarivo: Ankaratra; 2300 m; Bosser 8208 (MO[MO-2130759]!, TAN); VIII.1955. Station forestière de Manjakatompo (Est d’Ambatolampy); 2600 m; Cremers 1705[A] (MO[MO-2112954]!, PC[PC0788286], TAN); 22.VIII.1971. Ankaratra; Ouest d’Ambatolampy; 2500 m; Cremers 1957 (MO[MO-2858803]!, PC[PC0788287], TAN), 27.III.1972.

NOTES

These plants were reported by Marline et al. (2012) as Braunia secunda (Hook.) Bruch & Schimp. – the name they were originally distributed under (det. M. Onraedt). However, we recently redetermined the specimens as Braunia imberbis while examining the duplicates housed at MO. Two of the MO specimens were in fact already annotated by M. Crosby in 1974 as Hedwigidium integrifolium (P.Beauv.) Dixon , a name that has until recently been misapplied to this species (see Dalton et al. 2012). As pointed out by De Luna (2016) and others previously (cited therein), when confronted with non-reproductive material the separation of Braunia imberbis from Braunia secunda is rather difficult. The Malagasy specimens do not possess capsules; however, we found the region of strongly porose and elongate basal leaf cells to be consistently larger and more conspicuous in Braunia imberbis . This was easier to discern when the material was wetted with a 2% KOH solution, which usually stains this area bright red. Based on these findings Braunia secunda is excluded from the Malagasy flora and replaced by Braunia imberbis .