Cephaloziella integerrima in Crofty...

stacked image in natural light of perianths

stacked image in natural light of gemmiferous shoots

stacked image in natural light of older perianths

1' high tump with patches of C. integerrima

1' high post hole tumps with patches of fruiting C. integerrima
another line of tumps behind the bund also hold patches

...well, I think so! A brief stop today to look at some semi-interesting flora growing on a few spoil tumps in the middle of an abandoned building plot revealed a good quantity of a richly fertile Cephaloziella. With angular gemmae, edentate lobed perianth bracts that are connate, I'm pretty confident this must be integerrima, a potential first for Wales. If confirmed I'll need to determine how extensive the population is. I have a feeling building works were stopped ~6 years ago, as the developer did not have planning permission. This is a highly vulnerable population, but best we get the id confirmed first before looking at safeguarding the species at this site. There is no referee listed for this genus in the latest FB, so Sam, I wonder if you can suggest someone who would be willing to examine a voucher, yourself perhaps? [I called in very briefly again the following day and noted integerrima to be present on a few additional tumps, the mounds being the ground excavated for a series of post holes about 10 years ago!].

phone pic of abundant perianths

 

The list of direct associates noted so far includes:

Anthoxanthum odoratum

Archidium alternifolium

Brachytheciastrum velutinum

Bryum dichotomum

Calliergonella cuspidata

Cephaloziella divaricata (photo of female perianth below, male plants also present)

Ceratodon purpureus

Cladonia chlorophaea agg.

Cladonia furcata subsp. furcata

Cladonia cf. ramulosa

Cladonia rangiformis

Cynosurus cristatus

Didymodon fallax

Festuca ovina

Fossombronia sp.

Lotus corniculatus

Pilosella officinarum

Plantago coronopus

Plantago lanceolata

Pleuridium cf. acuminatum

Poa trivialis

Trifolium dubium

Trifolium repens

C. divaricata

Thanks to the gulls

I was in Bangor earlier this week for Butterfly Conservation's annual grant meeting with NRW. I always try and get up early enough to have a morning stroll before the meeting. This proved worthwhile last year, with Schistidium elegantulum new for VC49 on a wall near our hotel, but this year there was something much better...

I was woken well before my alarm by noisy gulls on the roof, and so my walk took me a bit further out of town than usual. I headed west through the narrow band of oak woodland at the top of the foreshore, above the Menai Strait. There was a fair diversity of bryos in an inviting looking crevice in the rocks, kept damp by overhanging oak boughs. A few samples were grabbed, and on checking these at home yesterday evening I was delighted and more than a little surprised to find Cephaloziella turneri among them.

Des Callaghan found this nationally rare liverwort in a gorge in Meirionydd in 2015 - the first North Wales record in nearly a century. My find was in surroundings more like the creek bank sites in Pembrokeshire, with associates being Mnium hornum, Diplophyllum albicans, Lejeunea lamacerina and Saccogyna viticulosa. My sample contained a single perianth.

For once, I was grateful to the noisy gulls.

more odd moss on spoil

Today's lunchtime outing with Alfie was to another spoil site just up the road at Grovesend (SN597007). There were no odd-looking Fissidens, but the odd-looking Didymodon I reported last November (see here)[confirmed as icmadophilus], growing on concrete bases not far from this site, was again locally abundant. The 'scope pic shows it alongside fallax and note the adaxial costal cells are predominantly square. The substrate this time was seasonally inundated, fine black spoil - other species present where it occurred would suggest mildly basic conditions. I think previously we cautiously concluded rigidulus provided the best fit, though the outcome was not completely satisfactory. I'll send a sample to Sam to see if can pin it down, but opinions are always welcome. The only other oddities were Homalothecium lutescens growing as an epiphyte on a Hawthorn trunk and what looked like a sterile, flat-leaved Weissia with the same habit as controversa var. densifolia? Other general interest was provided by male plants of Didymodon fallax (photo below) and some nice fruiting patches of Cephaloziella divaricata (bottom photo).

Llanelli 1919 tower

Ian Morgan tipped me off about a site with contaminated ground at the former tin works by the 1919 tower at Machynys (SS520988). So, today on a return journey from Llanelli, I made a brief visit to the area immediately east of the tower. Unfortunately I later found out that the area west of the tower is the main area of contamination, so I’ll have to look at this next time I’m passing. Consequently the list of 28 species noted today included few species to indicate that the area I searched was heavily contaminated, the only ones mildly suggestive of contamination including Cephaloziella hampeana frequent (photo 2), Solenostoma gracillimum rare, Weissia controversa var. controversa occasional and Lophozia excisa locally frequent (photos 3-4), the latter with odd bryophilus spore-producing bodies attached (photos 3-6) - if anyone can shed any light on these it will satidfy my curiosity. NB spores 10μm.

Solenostoma struggle

When I saw this I assumed it was gracillimum, but it seemed to lack thickened leaf margins and attenuated shoots and just looked a bit different, so I collected a bit to check. Using Paton it tenuously keyed out as hyalinum - I'm not sure how convincing the bracts on the perianth are as a feature as gracillimum can show this to a degree it seems, but the presence of purple rhizoids is said to rule it out. I'm not terribly convinced this is hyalinum but as it would be new for the county I'd be grateful for any comments.

The habitat was the north-facing retaining wall (slag & sandstone) along the railway in the north of Swansea at Llwynbrwydrau (SS70039752). Most patches were growing on their own, but occasional associates included Pohlia nutans, Ceratodon purpureus, Cephaloziella stellulifera (photo below), Brachytheciastrum velutinum & Bryum sp. There must be a substantial population as I suspect this wall extends a long way east and west. This was a sneaky quick peak at a 5m section by my crossing point and it begs the question could the railway sections using slag be a potential habitat for Scopelophila?

Mining for moss

Visits to three Ceredigion lead mines last Friday produced several nice things.  I'll start with 3 showy species: Racomitrium elongatum, Tetraplodon mnioides and Hedwigia stellata.  The Racomitrium is pretty frequent in the Cambrian Mountains and its long reflexed hairpoints are a good pointer (before microscope checking).  Tetraplodon is present on most Mid Wales mines, where it grows on scats and bones.  Hedwigia stellata is surprisingly sparsely distributed in Ceredigion, and the two tufts I saw were on tarmac - the first time I've seen it on this substrate.

 

Prize for smallest and grottiest goes to Ditrichum plumbicola and D. lineare.  The two colonies of D. plumbicola were both "new" - the 15th & 16th sites for this species in Mid Wales - in part because nobody had specifically looked for it on those sites.  The D. lineare was also "new", and was unusual because it's generally found on natural sites in Wales rather than on mines.  Ditrichum plumbicola has blunt-tipped leaves and plane margins, whereas the D. lineare has acute tips and slightly recurved margins.

 

Prize for rarest may go to D. plumbicola, but with a bit of luck I'll be able to confirm that a colony of very toothy Cephaloziella is C. nicholsonii.  This would be only the 5th Welsh locality for this British endemic.  It was growing at the foot of an old wheel pit wall, and it's interesting to note that the first Ceredigion colony was on a wall on Cwmystwyth mine (found by David Holyoak).

I'll add some microscope photos of the Cephaloziella soon. 

Cephaloziella conundrum continued

I’ve taken another look at the Kilvey sample and it's left me more baffled than I was after my hurried examination last night. Some bract tubes are definitely lobed and lack thickened cells towards the margins (as in integerrima), though some look perfectly good for calyculata! It’s not difficult to find 2-celled leaf lobe apices (rare in calyculata) and leaves that are divided >½ way (both good integerrima features). The largely calcifuge associate list also points to integerrima rather than calyculata, but as both are known occur on mine spoil, it's probably not worth putting any weight on this. I'm seriously wondering if both species might be present? I’ll send my samples on to Sam for expert opinion and will be keeping my fingers crossed. The image below is high resolution, which if you on to open full size and then save it, you can open it in your normal image browser and zoom in much more usefully than is possible in blogger.

Kilvey Hill liverwort query

I collected this troublesome liverwort from Kilvey Hill today. When I collected it, I thought it looked like Lophozia excisa, but it appeared to have odd-looking tubular bracts with undeveloped perianths inside. At home I looked up Lophozia, but Paton states the perianths in this genus are free, so I turned to the Cephaloziella key and ran it down to integerrima - very unlikely, but remotely possible. I can't help feeeling I'm missing something more obvious here, so any help appreciated as it's been a long week! I'll take some better images in natural light tomorrow if it's not resolved, but these will have to do for now. Growing on an acidic path-side earth bank, associates included C. divaricata, Fissidens bryoides, Brachytheciastrum velutinum, Solenostoma gracillimum, Ceratodon purpureus, etc.