Horizontal stems subterranean. Upright shoots treelike, many branched, branchlets numerous and strongly differentiated; annual bud constrictions absent; leaves on main stem below lateral branchlets tightly appressed, needlelike, 3.5--4.5 X 0.6--0.7 mm, soft. Lateral branchlets flat in cross section, 6--9 mm diam.; annual bud constrictions inconspicuous. Leaves in 6 ranks, 1 on upperside, 4 lateral, ascending-spreading, 2.5--5.5 X 0.5--1.2 mm, and 1 on underside, much smaller than others, ascending; margins entire; apex lacking hair tip. Strobili 1--6 at tip of shoot, sessile, 12--60 mm. Sporophylls 3 X 2 mm, apex long, gradually narrowing. 2 n = 68. Rich hardwood forests and successional shrubby areas; 0--1600 m; N.B., N.S., Ont., Que.; Ala., Conn., Del., Ga., Ky., Maine, Md., Mass., Mich., Ohio, Pa., N.H., N.J., N.Y., N.C., R.I., S.C., Tenn., Vt., Va., W.Va., Wis.

Prostrate stems deeply subterranean, elongate, branched; erect stems scattered, simple below, freely branched above, to 3 dm, the main axis 2 mm thick, the branchlets terete or flattened; lvs numerous, shining, 6-8-ranked, linear-subulate, all alike or ±dimorphic, 4.6 נ0.8-1.2 mm, entire, firm, sharp-pointed; cones terminating some of the branches; sessile, 1-4 cm, 5-7 mm thick; sporophylls yellowish, broad-based, abruptly acuminate, with hyaline, inconspicuously erose margins; sporangia reniform, 1.5-2 mm wide; spores with the commissural faces more finely reticulate than the outer, otherwise as in no. 9 [Lycopodium annotinum L.]; 2n=68. Moist woods and bog-margins in acid soil; boreal Amer. and Asia, s. in e. U.S. to n. Ga., Ala., Ind., and Mo.

Gleason, Henry A. & Cronquist, Arthur J. 1991. Manual of vascular plants of northeastern United States and adjacent Canada. lxxv + 910 pp.

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