Lethocolea indica G.Asthana & Maurya, Natl. Acad. Sci. Lett. 37(6): 535. 2014. (Fig. 3)

Type: INDIA:— Western Himalaya, Uttarakhand, Pauri (Garhwal hills), 30°08.462’N, 78°46.920’E; ca 1788 m; 23 Oct. 2010; Asthana et al. 20985/10 (holotype: LWU, not seen).

Plants creeping, 5–10 mm long, 0.5–1.3 mm wide, white-green to green. Stems dorsiventrally flattened, 160– 200×216–305 μm, 10–15 cells wide and 10–12 cells thick, cortical cells rectangular to subquadrate, weakly thickwalled, 16–56×10–34 μm, medullary cells rectangular to subquadrate, thin-walled, 10–34×8–23 μm, branching scarce. Rhizoids hyaline to slightly brown, numerous, scattered on ventral surface of green stem. Leaves imbricate, succubous, subvertically arranged and appressed to spreading outwards on stem apex, but usually obliquely to widely spreading outwards on stem middle and base (the lower portions sometimes stoloniferous), ovate to broadly ovate, 0.65–0.93 mm long, 0.50–0.85 mm wide, apex rounded, margin entire, dorsal and ventral bases not or very slightly decurrent. Leaf cells thin-walled; trigones indistinct to small, triangular; intermediate thickenings absent, cuticle smooth; apical cells of leaf subquadrate to rectangular, 20–38×13–25 μm, median cells mostly hexagonal, 25–45×22–45 μm, basal cells, elongated, 40–62×25–38 μm. Oil bodies large, 1 per cell, grayish to grayish-brown, ovoid to elliptical, 10–20×7–18 μm, of compound type, granular-botryoidal, sometimes with 1–3 pupils. Underleaves absent. Androecia and gynoecia not seen. Vegetative reproduction by discoid gemmae, gemmae pale green to slightly brown, mostly vertically on dorsal stem surface or in leaf axils, 150–260 um (9–18 cells) in diameter, biconvex, 3–5 cells thick, but margin crenulate to irregularly crenate, unistratose, forming a 1–2 cell wide wing. Gemmalings not seen.

Specimen examined:— China. Yunnan, Xundian Co., Black-necked Crane Provincial Nature Reserve, 25°35ʹ1ʺ N, 103°0ʹ54ʺ E, 5 Aug. 2024, R. L. Zhu et al. 20240805-20 B (HSNU).

Distribution and habitat:—In China, Lethocolea indica is known only from the Black-necked Crane Provincial Nature Reserve, Xundian Co., Yunnan, China (Fig. 4). It grows on a slope beside a road in a peatland at an altitude of 2758 m, associated with several bryophytes such as Ditrichum orientale (Mitten 1891: 154) Fedosov & Kučera in Fedosov et al. (2025: 247), Fossombronia himalayensis Kashyap (1915: 4), Jungermannia (Linnaeus 1753: 1131) sp., and Phymatoceros (Stotler et al. 2005: 113) sp. (Fig. 3B, 3E).