Bryum bonanza in artificial dune slacks

Margam Tip currently has a good amount of bare wet sand around the newest pools, much of which is covered with a bewildering array of Bryum forms. B. dichotomum and B. gemmiferum appear to be the two most abundant species, but there's quite a bit of B. argenteum, a little B. pseudotriquetrum and in the drier areas, what I suspect is frequent B. algovicum. Some julaceous shoots resemble B. dyffrynense, though id as gemmiferum or indeterminate seems inevitable! I'll hopefully find time over the weekend to take a closer look at the collections I made.

Also at Cosmeston...

It was great to see the Thatch Moss in situ, but I was almost as excited to find two other species new to me during a brief foray after the thatch photo session.

Firstly, I spent a little while investigating the mixed bryo community growing on the clayey margin in the SE corner of the western lake, while Barry was busy trying to hook stoneworts with his home-made grapnel. This included a nice patch of Bryum gemmiferum, which appears to be the first record for East Glamorgan. Associates were Pohlia melanodon, Didymodon tophaceus, Dicranella varia and Bryum dichotomum. It was noticeably taller and paler than the latter.

Bryum gemmiferum

 There are some gemmae in focus near the bottom left of the photo if you click to enlarge.

Bryum gemmiferum habitat

While using the board-walk to get back to the car I remembered the photo in Sam's Pembs flora of Amblystegium radicale growing on the base of dead Phragmites, so took a brief detour into the reedbed and grabbed a handful of moss from this habitat. Sadly it wasn't the Amblystegium, but turned out to be Oxyrrhynchium speciosum, which I think is new for ST16. A few photos below - it looks to have all the hallmarks of this species: dark green and widely-spaced leaves, strongly toothed margins, long nerve, twisted tip, complanate branches - but if anyone disagrees with the ID please let me know!