Dioicous. Plants gregarious or scattered on soil, slender, complanate, the leaves distichous or with an intermittent third row. Stems with a central strand, simple or branching from basal buds, brownish, bare below. Protonema with two phases, either transitory with normal cylindrical cells or, in very shaded habitats, persistent with highly refractive lenticular cells, reproducing by gemmae. Rhizoidal gemmae occasionally present. Leaves blue-green, distant, bract-like in lower part of stem, often overlapping above, oval to oblong, vertically to obliquely inserted, asymmetrical with the basiscopic lamina long-decurrent; apex short-apiculate to rounded; margin usually entire, occasionally crenulate; costa failing above mid-leaf; laminal cells subquadrate to rounded-hexagonal.

Fertile shoots usually with at least perichaetial leaves radially arranged and with transverse insertions. Perichaetia terminal. Calyptra short-conical, persistent on tip of operculum. Capsules exserted, cylindrical; operculum finely tapered. Peristome double, red-brown, with 16 long slender tapered exostome teeth and c. 32 nodulose endostome processes forming a dome over the capsule mouth.

Native.

A monotypic family with a single species; native to New Guinea, Australia and New Zealand.

Mitteniaceae Broth., Nat. Pflanzenfam. I, 3: 532 (1903). Type: Mittenia Lindb.

Opinions vary concerning the order to which Mitteniaceae belongs. Mittenia was originally placed in the Mniaceae (Bryales) by W.Mitten (1860), but Brotherus (1903) introduced Mitteniaceae, still in the Bryales, and this has been accepted by most modern authors. Shaw (1985) argued that the unique peristome structure warrants a new order Mitteniales, whereas Stone (1986) suggested that placement in Schistostegales would be more appropriate as Schistostega D.Mohr and Mittenia have the same distinctive protonema, some vegetative similarities and, although the former lacks a peristome, the internal structure of the capsule does not preclude a relationship with Mittenia. The family was placed in the Rhizogoniales in Buck & Goffinet’s (2000) classification, although, more recently, it has been included in the Pottiales (Goffinet et al., 2012).

Brotherus, V.F. (1903), Mitteniaceae, Nat. Pflanzenfam. I, 3: 532.

Brotherus, V.F. (1924), Mitteniaceae, Nat. Pflanzenfam., 2nd edn, 10: 422–423.

Buck, W.R. & Goffinet, B. (2000), Morphology and classification of mosses, in A.J.Shaw & B.Goffinet (eds), Bryophyte Biology: 71–123.

Goffinet, B., Shaw, A.J. & Buck, W.R. (2012), Classification of the Bryophyta. [http://www.eeb.uconn.edu/people/goffinet/Classificationmosses.html]

Mitten, W. (1860), Description of some new species of Musci from New Zealand…, J. Proc. Linn. Soc., Bot. 4: 64–100.

Sainsbury, G.O.K. (1955), A handbook of New Zealand mosses, Bull. Roy. Soc. New Zealand 5: 1–490.

Shaw, A.J. (1985), Peristome structure in the Mitteniales (ord. nov.: Musci), a neglected novelty, Syst. Bot. 10: 224–233.

Stone, I.G. (1961), The highly refractive protonema of Mittenia plumula (Mitt.) Lindb. (Mitteniaceae), Proc. Roy. Soc. Victoria 74: 119–124.

Stone, I.G. (1961), The gametophore and sporophyte of Mittenia plumula (Mitt.) Lindb., Austral. J. Bot. 9: 124–150.

Stone, I.G. (1986), The relationship between Mittenia plumula (Mitt.) Lindb. and Schistostega pennata (Hedw.) Web. & Mohr, J. Bryol. 14: 301–314.

I.G. Stone (2012), Australian Mosses Online 38. Mitteniaceae. Australian Biological Resources Study, Canberra. Version 9 June 2012. 

First published as: I.G.Stone (2006), Mitteniaceae, Fl. Australia 51: 369–370. Australian Biological Resources Study, Canberra & CSIRO Publishing, Melbourne.