Humid dune slack at Kenfig NNR

dune slack vegetation supporting Drepanocladus sendtneri, overtopped by Salix repens and Carex nigra tussocks

The small slack south of the bird hide floods quite deep (~80cm) during the winter, although yesterday it was bone dry. The composition and structure of higher and lower plants in this slack is very different to that found in the scraped slacks across the reserve, in fact I have been surprised by the range of vegetation variation there is between slacks at Kenfig. Interestingly, the most abundant bryophyte species in the western half of the slack I was looking at yesterday (in compartment 4a) was Fontinalis antipyretica (four photos below). In places it replaced Calliergonella cuspidata as the dominant underscrub species, forming thick wefts beneath Salix repens scrub, as-well-as carpeting areas of open ground and growing as pendant drapes off the lower limbs and trunks of Salix cinerea. I can see Sam noted similar growths in nearby slacks too, but it's the first time that I have encountered it as a major component of slack vegetation.

 

More significant vegetation in the slack included some good patches of Drepanocladus sendtneri (at SS79628103 - top photo - and SS79568102), which are to be safeguarded from proposals to rejuvenate parts of the slack. A robust form of D. aduncus was also frequent in the slack and some some material seemed indeterminate to my eye, even after examining it under the microscope.

D. sendtneri

Miscellaneous observations of less the familiar taxa included Puccinia cancellata on Juncus acutus and Tuberolachnus salignus (Large Grey Willow Aphid) noted crawling around the lower limbs of Salix cinerea.