Parc le Breos

Conocephalum salebrosum - Pellia endiviifolia mat

I was passing Parkmill yesterday so I stopped to look at the Parc le Breos roadside cutting identified by Graham a week or two back. It was a bit drier than I expected and there was in fact very little in the way of tufa formation, but along with locally frequent Encalypta streptocarpa, Eucladium verticillatum, Pellia endiviifolia, Leiocolea turbinata and occasional Jungermannia atrovirens  and Tortella tortuosa were a few additional species of local interest, notably a few good patches of Conocephalum salebrosum and Didymodon spadiceus, both previously with just single records for Gower made during Sam’s Bishopston survey.

quite distinctive large shoots of Didymodon spadiceus,
when wetted produced straight, loosely patent leaves (>4mm long)

fortunately a few capsules were present
showing the diagnostic short peristome

Also growing there was this little puzzler, with scattered plants of what looked good for Pohlia lutescens. The presence of tubers and decurrent leaves seemed to limit the number of possibilities, however the cell measurements were a little larger than those given in Smith, the leaves not as toothy as shown and the habitat seemed atypical, growing on powdery (humid but not wet) soil in deep shade below an overhang growing with L. turbinata. So, I’m suspecting I may be on the wrong tracks with this one, but not sure what other options there are? Help!

Radyr Quarry revisited

In fading light yesterday afternoon I finally managed a follow up visit to Radyr Quarry, having looked at the southern end of the quarry face in December (see here). I only managed to access a relatively small area at the northern end and this was similar in character to what I found before, with quite a bit of Leiocolea turbinata on soil-capped ledges and a few small patches of Eucladium verticillatum. Only two additional taxa were found, Trichostomum crispulum (which was common) and a Conocephalum species. I've only seen C. conicum in my local area but this patch had a distinct salebrosum look to it. The thallus has distinct grooves on the dorsal surface, as seen in the photos below. 

I wasn't 100% sure from this feature alone, so I also checked the hyaline cells at the thallus margin which, according to the Szweykowski et al. paper which first separated the two species (available here), should be 1-2 rows wide in conicum and 3-4 rows wide in salebrosum. In the photo below (click to enlarge) they are mostly 2 cells wide.

 

So this does appear to be salebrosum, though I'd like to have some fresh conicum to hand for comparison. As far as I know all the previous VC41 records since these species were split in 2005 have been from northern NPT, RCT and Merthyr Tydfil, so this site would be a bit of an outlier.

George, seems you are still missing some records from your version. Updated maps of Conocephalum taxa as follows:

coastal tufa liverworts

A few more trips on the Glamorgan Coast over the last few weeks. Highlights include accidentally finding the most easterly record of the Maidenhair Fern Adiantum capillus-veneris associated with Pellia endiviifolia and Eucladium verticallatum on a small patch of tufa in a small crevasse in Penarth cliff (most easterly record) and only confirmed record in the ST17 square (ST1865769887). It was also at this location that gravity supplied me with a nice block of tufa, which I duly sliced in half – noting it was entirely formed from numerous layers of Pellia…I wonder how long this takes to form and could it be geochemically dated ?

Pellia endiviifolia forming its own lump of tufa 

Thus far the majority of the coastal tufa cliff face liverworts appear to be Pellia sp however Julian Woodman (NRW) took me to see the elusive Southbya tophacea at the Aberthaw-Fontygary cliff section. It took a bit of squinting but once located we could just about get close enough to it for a look with our faces pressed up against the dripping rock face.  It occurred over a 10-20 m section, not continuously but in small patches, the cliff face protected by scrub and other plants, providing shade and protection from sea spray and winds. In places it looked like it was being ‘overcome’ by other more vigorous mosses but that may just be my novice eye.

Julian Woodman up close and personal with Southbya and a lot of Maidenhair Fern

blink and you'll miss it:  Southbya tophacea in amongst bases of the Maidenhair Fern - perhaps it will be associated with the fern elsewhere across the coast??

After a spot of lunch in the Fox and Hounds we popped over to Southerndown to the Cwm Mawr stream (SS8936572263), that’s the one that forms the waterfall that cascades onto the beach below. The stream section up on the cliff is quite spectacular tufa forming stream jam packed with mosses and liverworts in amongst a thick matt of yellow iris over a 100m or so stretch.

Cwm Mawr (SS 89365 72263) view to east - at least 100m of tufa forming stream packed with goodies in between yellow iris matt. Worth a visit Barry ?

The most common liverwort at Cwm Mawr was a thallose liverwort with thallus >1cm, lacking obvious midrib (to me anyhow),  gammae in obvious receptacles, upper surface of thallus covered in air pores in the centre of polygonal markings,  the capsules are distinctive ‘mushroom shape’ and I cant seem to find this in ‘the book’ or get close using the key. Can anyone help ? Im guessing its a common species.

Cwm Mawr SS 89365 72263 tufa forming stream above the cliff. I'm stuck on the ID for this thallose liverwort can anyone help, its distinctive 'mushroom' shaped capsule should be a give away ?