More bits and pieces

With limited time for square bashing lately, I thought I'd start to target a few squares close to home which are lacking records of the 10 commonest species. So, today I walked Alfie on Fairwood Common in an effort to add Ceratodon purpureus to SS59R and ended up spending 45 minutes splodging around the boggy area opposite the entrance to the university playing fields (SS576925). There were no major surprises, but it was nice to find Cephalozia connivens and a few patches of Sphagnum compactum on a bog / wet-heath mosaic where there was a great abundance of Hypericum elodes. A few calcicoles were found adjacent to the road, where I suspect buried Limestone chippings provide localised base enrichment in a square otherwise dominated by calcifuge species.

C.connivens growing in Trichophorum tussock, the main associates 

being Hyp.jut., Cal.fis,, Cep.bic., Mni.hor. & Cam.pyr. 

Sphagnum compactum

Straminergon stramineum growing
through mounds of Sphagnum subnitens

I did eventually find some Ceratodon...

Dulais Valley at Coynant

A rain-soaked walk through flushed pasture at SN650069 yesterday returned a modest selection of species of local interest including Aneura pinguis, Aulacomnium palustre, Brachythecium rivulare, Bryum pseudotriquetrum, Philonotis fontana, Riccardia chamedryfolia, Sarmentypnum exannulatum, Scapania irrigua, S. undulata, Sphagnum denticulatum, inundatum, squarrosum, subnitens (photo below) & Straminergon stramineum.

Deep mounds of Nardia compressa (photo above) were abundant in the adjacent river and species of interest along the banks included Dichodontium palustre (photo above), Dicranella rufescens, Ditrichum heteromallum (photo above) & Entosthodon obtusus (photos below).

Note the bordered leaf margins, which rules out all other Entosthodon species with erect capsules.