Class Anthocerotae

Class Anthocerotae

There is just one family of Hornworts which form the smallest group of Bryophytes. Hornworts have a flattened creeping thallus in which the sex organs are embedded and each fertilised egg can grow into a sporophyte plant. Unlike the Moss sporophyte, the Hornwort's spore-producing body is not always entirely dependent on the mother plant but can exist on its own. The picture shows a section through the foot of this small independence-seeker. This could have been an evolutionary step towards the ferns in which the main plant is a free-living sporophyte. [CH] {ML}