Identification notes
Once known, Hookeria lucens can be identified without any risk of confusing it with anything else…unless you are bryologising in a coastal creek in Cornwall that is (more below!).
Those who have not encountered Hookeria before are wowed by its beauty and distinctiveness but because it’s very complanate and quite large, may assume it is a leafy liverwort. However, it lacks complicate-folded leaves, underleaves, trigones, oil bodies and any of the other features that are often present in the leafy liverworts. Fortunately, plants often have stout-looking capsules in the autumn and winter.
On sheltered banks in Cornish creeks, Hookeria sometimes grows with the very rare Calyptrochaeta apiculata and they look rather alike. C. apiculata is usually a little smaller and its leaves have an obvious border of narrow marginal cells not seen in Hookeria. The leaf shape is also different, contracting into a distinct apiculus.
Read the Field Guide account
