English: Lesser clubmoss; Club spikemoss; Northern spikemoss; Low spikemoss; Prickly mountain-moss.
Region: Northern Hemisphere,northern Europe, Asia, America Greenland, Iceland, Faroe Islands; Austria at elevations above
Habitat: damp places, bogs, shores of streams and lakes, wet cliffs and ledges, grassland and dune slacks; neutral to alkaline soils, mountainous areas.
Ecology: does not grow in areas with tall, dense vegetation.
BotanyFern; spikemoss; resembles a moss; small; delicate; low-growing.
Stem: perennial; sterile; short; slender; irregularly branched; up to 15 cm long; creeping, but turn upwards near the tip.
Reproduction: annual fertile shoots are more robust than the sterile stems, stand erect; 3 to 6 cm tall, up to 10 cm when conditions are favourable, 4 to 6 mm across; leaves slightly longer than of the sterile stems, spirally arranged around the stem, pointing upwards; bearing stout, yellowish cones, slightly differentiated from the branch.
Leaves: small; pointed; triangular; 1 to 2 mm long; bearing a ligule on its upper surface near the base.
Sporangia: on the cones; two kinds, lobed megasporangia in the lower part of the cone which produce megaspores and simple microsporangia in the upper part which produce many tiny microspores.
TaxonomySelaginella deflexa from Hawaii, is the only close relative.