4. Splachnum sphaericum Hedw. 卵叶壶藓 luan-ye hu xian
Sp. Musc. Frond. 55. 1801. Type. Lapland: Olof Swartz s.n.
Splachnum ovatum Hedw., Sp. Musc. Frond. 54. 1801.
Plants rather small to medium-sized, 0.5–3.0 cm high, soft, yellowish green, in loose tufts. Stems usually not branched. Leaves smaller below, much larger and crowded above, broadly obovate, 3–5 mm long, contorted when dry, constricted near base, abruptly shortly acuminate at apex; margins plane, entire to bluntly and irregularly
serrulate; costa subpercurrent to percurrent; upper leaf cells oblong-hexagonal or irregularly hexagonal, lower cells shortly rectangular, thin-walled. Autoicous or dioicous. Perigonia budlike. Setae up to 8 cm long, slender, yellowish brown below, yellowish above; capsules with short-cylindrical urns, orange-red, apophyses spherical or shortly obovoid, not much broader than the urns, dark or purplish red when mature; opercula small, bluntly convex; annuli none; peristome teeth dark yellowish to orange-brown. Calyptrae falling off at early stage. Spores maturing in middle or late summer.