Pal y Cwrt pit stop

Last Saturday we went for a drive over Mynydd Du and during a pit stop at Pal y Cwrt in the hope of a migrant Ring Ouzel (none, but lots of Wheatears in song) I noticed a lovely patch of Antennaria dioica, which was lf in a 6m x 4m area at SN67681813. I made a very quick list of associates and grabbed a small sample with a mix of liverworts and some fruiting Weissia for checking, from the location arrowed above, these being: Ctenidium molluscum, Ditrichum gracile, Encalypta streptocarpa, Hypnum cupressiforme var. lacunosum, Lophozia excisa, Plagiochila porelloides, Thymus polytrichus, Tortella tortuosa and Weissia brachycarpa var. obliqua. My sample also contained shoots that look very much like Bryum kunzei, which is not known from Carmarthensire, so I'll send the sample to Tom, unless Sam would like to take a look first.

Home tetrad

Remnant areas of coal spoil at Melin Mynach / Toyoda factory

I’ve still not done any square-bashing this year, though I’ve made a few short revisits to sites close to home, which on Saturday included a 40 minute session at a remnant fragment of a former coal spoil tip by the Toyoda factory (SS595998), about 1km from the house. A total of 69 taxa have so far been recorded at the site, 41 occurring directly on spoil, though my visits here have always been casual, so undoubtedly there's more to discover. The assemblage in the area I looked at on Saturday included locally frequent Didymodon fallax, Fissidens adianthoides and Weissia brachycarpa var. obliqua (photos below), suggestive that the spoil there is mildly basic, though other calcicoles generally occurred at lower frequencies. Surprisingly this short visit added five more species to my home tetrad taking the total to 127.