Moerckia

Have eventually managed to get back into my Google account ...

Now that autumn has set in (i.e.the swifts have gone), my mind is turning again to bryos.

A recent trip with Jonathan Saville to some sloppy calcareous flushes in the Black Mountains just SE of the Grwyne Reservoir, which we first spotted last winter, proved quite rewarding for vascular plants, with a strong population of Eriophorum latifolium and small pops of Carex lepidocarpa and Carex dioica amongst other things.    One of my main reasons for revisiting was that I hoped to refind Amblyodon dealbatus, which was reported from this area during an NCC survey of the upland vegetation in the 1980s.  No joy with that moss, but a small area less than 0.5m  diameter with some tufa deposition caught my eye and sure enough a small amount of Moerckia flotoviana was present.   I have come across perhaps half a dozen sites for this liverwort scattered across the National Park all as very small populations in similar tufaceous habitat, usually present as a very restricted area in flushes dominated by the likes of Palustriella commutata and Scorpidium species.  Moerckia may prove to be relatively frequent in areas where there has been a lot of lime working, such as the Foel Fawr on Mynydd Du, but it seems amazing that it is able to find and colonise such rare habitat often hidden away in seas of Nardus and Molinia.