Bryophytes MCQ - Practice Questions with Answers

• These are non vascular terrestrial plants present mostly in moist places.
• Bryophytes are called so because they depend on external water for fertilization and completion of their life cycle.
• Bryophytes are the first land plants. 
• The main plant body is gametophytic. It can be thalloid i.e. not differentiated into root, stem and leaves or foliose i.e. leafy.

Reproduction in Bryophytes:

• Vegetative reproduction occurs by various methods such as fragmentation of the older thallus, adventitious branches detached from thallus to form new thalli.
• Sexual reproduction is of oogamous type. 
• The sex organs are multicellular and jacketed.
• Sex organs are multicellular and jacketed.
• The male sex organ is called as antheridium and female sex organs are called archegonium. 
• The antheridium forms biflagellate male gametes and the archegonium has only one egg cell.
• Fertilisation is by zooidogamous oogamy. Archegonia secrete sugars which attract male gametes by chemotaxy.
• The zygote develops into a multicellular relatively undifferentiated embryo which becomes adult sporophyte.
• Sporophyte remains attached to the gametophyte as a partial or complete parasite.
• Sporophyte has foot, seta or meristematic zone and capsule. In some cases, foot and seta can be absent. 
• The capsule has spore mother cells which divide meiotically to form spores. All the spores are morphologically similar and hence Homosporous.
• Bryophytes depict heteromorphic alternation of generations and life cycle is Haplo- diplontic.
• Eg: Riccia, Funaria, Anthoceros

Economic importance of Bryophytes:

• Bryophytes act as food for herbivores.
• Sphagnum is also known as peat moss forms peat which is used as fuel and as packing material for transporting live specimens as it holds more water.
• Bryophytes form a mat on the soil and reduce the impact of falling rain on the soil to prevent soil erosion.

TIP: 

• Bryophytes, pteridophytes and gymnosperms bear the female sex organs called the archegonium (pl. archegonia). 
• It is a flask-shaped body with a neck and a swollen base called ventre. 
• The egg cell (female gamete) is present in the ventre. 
• Due to this,
• bryophytes, pteridophytes and gymnosperms are called the archegoniate plants.