Plants yellowish or brownish green. Stems reddish brown, 2–5 mm high, branching once by subperigonial innovation, with reddish brown rhizoids. Leaves erect-spreading, obovate to oblong-obovate, occasionally widest below the middle and ±oblong-ovate, 1.5–2.5 mm long, 0.6–0.8 mm wide, variably concave, tapered in the upper 1/3 to a broadly acute, acuminate or rarely obtuse apex, sometimes cuspidate or aristate; costa ending below the apex, percurrent or short- to long-excurrent, often variable within a population or even within a single plant, (30–) 36–45 (–60) µm wide near the base; margins entire (rarely bluntly dentate in the upper half). Upper laminal cells oblong-hexagonal, (24–) 30–69 × 15–18 (–25) µm, larger, more oblong and laxer below; marginal cells not differentiated; apical cell (45–) 60–165 (–285) µm long; alar cells few and moderately inflated, or not or weakly differentiated. Axillary filaments present.

Calyptra cucullate, rostrate. Setae 4–16 (–30) mm long, twisted weakly to the right throughout, pale reddish brown, weakly hygroscopic. Capsules erect, symmetrical or rarely slightly asymmetrical, obovoid-cylindrical, obovoid, or occasionally pyriform, 1.5–2.5 mm long, with a neck c. 1/3 (–1/2) the capsule length, usually strongly constricted below the mouth when dry; mouth 3/4 to equal the diameter of the capsule, transverse (very rarely oblique); exothecial cells 45–55 (–75) µm long, often with an obscure lumen, in cross-section with the anticlinal walls cuneate, c. 6–8 rows oblate at mouth; operculum plano-convex or umbonate. Peristome double, rarely single; exostome teeth usually well developed, straight or rarely weakly sigmoid, reddish brown, (150–) 180–225 × 45–60 µm (c. 45–135 × 36–45 µm in var. phymatodeus), tapered to a slender and often ±perforate or bi-lobed apex, striate, weakly trabeculate, and not appendiculate; endostome variable, rudimentary to well-developed, rarely seeming absent and with fragments adhering to the upper adaxial surface of teeth. Spores (27–) 31–39 (–41) µm diam., finely verrucate, lirate-murate or coarsely insulate, lacking a trilete scar.

Entosthodon subnudus (Taylor) Fife, J. Hattori Bot. Lab. 58: 192 (1985); Funaria subnuda Taylor, London J. Bot. 5: 57 (1846). Type: Swan R., W.A., 1843, J.Drummond s.n.; holotype: FH-Taylor; isotype: BM-Wilson.

Entosthodon subnudus is the most variable species of the genus in Australia. Gametophytically, the form of the leaf apex and the length of the costa are quite variable, as are seta and capsule length and the degree of endostome development.

Material which Sainsbury (1955) treated as Funaria gracilis and F. cuspidata, in addition to material not known to Sainsbury, are included here within a broadly circumscribed E. subnudus. The pattern of variability of E. gracilis and E. cuspidatus is such that the material treated by Sainsbury (1955: 244) as two species is here assigned to the widespread and comparatively common E. subnudus var. gracilis.

Too many intermediate specimens occur between the typical variety and var. gracilis to permit their recognition as species. The features noted in the key to varieties should allow placement for all but a small fraction of intermediate and/or aberrant specimens.

A.J.Fife & R.D.Seppelt (2012), Australian Mosses Online 67. Funariaceae. Australian Biological Resources Study, Canberra. Version 2 October 2012.