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#bryophytes
coprinellus-cluster · 3 months
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mosses from my walk yesterday in the hills
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New global research on soil mosses published today in Nature Geoscience reveals they play critical roles in sustaining life on our planet. Without soil mosses, Earth’s ability to produce healthy soils, provide habitat for microbes and fight pathogens would be greatly diminished.
The results of the new study indicate we have probably underestimated just how important soil mosses are.
Using data from 123 sites across all continents including Antarctica, we show that the soil beneath mosses has more nitrogen, phosphorus and magnesium, and a greater activity of soil enzymes than bare surfaces with no plants.
In fact, mosses affect all major soil functions, increasing carbon sequestration, nutrient cycling and the breakdown of organic matter. These processes are critical for sustaining life on Earth.
Our modelling revealed that soil mosses cover a huge area of the planet, about 9 million square kilometres – equivalent to the area of China. And that’s not counting mosses from boreal forests, which were not included in the study.
[...]
Mosses are extremely absorbent and can attract airborne dust particles. Some of these particles are incorporated into the soil below. It is not surprising then that they have such a strong effect on soils.
Our modelling shows that, across the globe, mosses store 6.4 gigatonnes more carbon than soils without plant cover.
Losing just 15% of the global cover of soil mosses would be equivalent to global emissions of carbon dioxide from all land use changes over a year, such as clearing and overgrazing.
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myxomycota · 8 days
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Lycogala epidendrum by andrei_forester
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mossinformed · 9 months
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I made my family pause Jurassic park bc there were cool lichens
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roberts-island · 29 days
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Consider: how fun it is when your coursework is aesthetically pleasing for once
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amanita-house · 2 years
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a cacophony
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rebeccathenaturalist · 4 months
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What Are Lithophytes?
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Originally posted on my website at https://rebeccalexa.com/what-are-lithophytes/
Ask most people what plants need to grow in, and they’ll say “soil” or “dirt”, right? And for the majority of terrestrial plants that’s the case. But given the sheer scale of biodiversity and the ability of species to make use of any niche–no matter how small–left unoccupied, there are of course exceptions. Take epiphytes, for example, that cling to the bark of trees and other plants. Rather than drawing nutrients and water from soil, they instead absorb what they need from the air. Psammophytes also get what they need from the air, but instead sink their root system into shifting sand dunes.
I am especially fascinated by lithophytes. “Litho-” means “stone”, and so a lithophyte is simply a plant that grows on stone. There are two main types of lithophyte. Epilithic lithophytes grow on a stone’s surface, and a crevice in the stone may be populated by endolithic lithophytes. Some of these plants can only grow on stone, so they’re described as obligate lithophytes, but their facultative lithophyte neighbors are those that are able to colonize both stone and soil or another substrate at the same time–some lithophytes can even live as tree-dwelling epiphytes instead!
Like epiphytes, a lithophyte may have some ability to absorb water and nutrients from the air. But they also capitalize on anything that ends up washed into their roots by rain. Endoliths may find that over time debris accumulating in their crevice offers a much-needed resource boost. As part or all of a lithophyte dies, the surrounding plants extract nutrients from the decaying matter–nothing goes to waste in nature, after all. They do not, as a general rule, have a negative effect on the rocks themselves; while some rock-dwelling lichens may chemically weather the stone beneath them, lithophytic plants simply use the rock as a convenient surface to take root.
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Arbuscular mycorrhizae within a root as seen under a microscope
What I find really cool is that lithophytes can be mycorrhizal! Their roots are pierced by colonies of various arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi that draw up nutrients from the soil and share them with the plants. While this is a very common relationship in nature–four out of every five vascular plant species uses arbuscular mycorrhizal networks–lithophytes seem to have cultivated a greater concentration of these helpful fungi.
A moss-covered rock is often someone’s first encounter with lithophytes. Lacking proper roots, mosses hang onto the stone with tiny rhizomes. Over time they might cover its entire surface, and if said surface is relatively flat and protected from weather and other erosive forces, their decaying remains could be the very beginning of a new patch of soil.
But it’s not just the little bryophytes like mosses that can eke out a living on a rock. More complex vascular plants may also take root on or within stone. One of my favorite ferns, the licorice fern (Polypodium glycyrrhiza) commonly grows as an epiphyte on trees in the Pacific Northwest, but given the right opportunity it will colonize a suitable crevice in a cliff. Orchids may have a reputation for being difficult to care for in captivity, but in the wild there are a lot of lithophytic species. Many, like Dendrobium teretifolium or many Phalaenopsis species, can also live quite well as epiphytes on a tree or other plant. And the wallflower, Erysimum cheiri, got its common name for its tendency to grow out of cracks in rocky slopes.
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Nepenthes campanulata
Unsurprisingly, some carnivorous plants make their homes on rocks, and their carnivory allows them access to much-needed nutrients in an otherwise limited setting. The pitcher plant Nepenthes campanulata often grows in colonies on cliff faces. Heliamphora exappendiculata, another pitcher plant, will happily grow both in wetlands and on constantly damp rocks. Sanderson’s bladderwort (Utricularia sandersonii) doesn’t eat insects, but instead sucks up microscopic organisms using bladders the plant buries under nearby soil or sediment.
One more thing: are the plants you see growing in gravel also lithophytes? Not necessarily. There may be soil beneath the gravel that the plant is exploiting. Or the gravel itself may be part of a mineral soil–one that has a lot of stone and not much organic material. A true lithophyte is going to be attached to a rock or rooted in its crevice, though it’s possible to find lithophytes growing on stones that, through weathering, may be feeding fragments into a nearby mineral soil over time.
Did you enjoy this post? Consider taking one of my online foraging and natural history classes or hiring me for a guided nature tour, checking out my other articles, or picking up a paperback or ebook I’ve written! You can even buy me a coffee here!
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spiffyspidr · 8 months
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Whilst you were out touching grass, I was touching moss you fool!
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lichenaday · 1 month
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Would I be correct in saying moss is a plant and lichen is a guy (fungus)?
*mostly* correct? Depending on who you ask. Moss (true moss) is a bryophyte--a non-vascular land plant. And lichens are a symbiotic association of a fungus and one or more photosynthesizing partners--an algae and/or a cyanobacteria. And when I say "one," I mean a colony of these single-celled organisms. We classify the organism based on the fungal partner since it is considered the obligate partner--it can only thrive with a photobiont partner--whereas the photobiont can survive outside of the lichen symbiosis. Mostly. It's complicated. Lichens are complicated.
So all this to say, lichens are a guys, not a guy. Hope this helps.
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poop-me-a-flower · 1 year
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MOSS
featuring: moss (my greatest triumph thus far)
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dailybotany · 8 months
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Time for our non-vascular plant friends to get some love!
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Today's plant is: some kind of Sphagnum!
Sphagnum is the primary contributor to peat deposits in bogs and fens worldwide. These wetlands have made a name for themselves in the last few years as both a quirky internet thing and as globally significant carbon sinks.
While sphagnum is known for being in bogs and fens, species of it grow in all kinds of habitats, provided there's a regular source of moisture. Case in point: I found these funky lil guys on a granite shelf on the side of a mountain in full sun!
You can tell this is sphagnum because of the spherical spore capsules and pyramid-shaped and tightly clustered capitulescence (fancy botany word for the top of the moss). I think they look a little bit star-shaped. These specimens were mid-spore release. All the brown dooblies on little green bracts are the spore carrying gametophytes.
Extra fun facts:
Sphagnum are really cool because they have something called "explosive dehiscence", which means their little spore capsules propel the spores by literally exploding open. I could actually hear them going off in the sun!
Sphagnum can hold 16 to 26 times their dry weight in water because of a matrix of large, empty, "dead" cells called hyaline cells. These cells have a pore that allows them to efficiently take on water — like little water jugs!
*I don't have a species ID for this because I was a) on national park property and don't have a permit to collect bryophytes and b) I frankly wouldn't have collected regardless because sphagnum ID is so! hard! And while I'm glad I know how to do it if need be, I don't do it recreationally--my hands are too shaky for microscopy and the keys are insane.
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slugzill4 · 1 year
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mossy mazegill polypore
Cerrena unicolor
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grumpyfenris · 1 year
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Probably too niche, but here's a cross section of a moss stem (Fissidens rigudulus var. rigidulus) I did that I'm proud of. Less than a cell thick!! With my own hands and a shitty razor blade!
Look at the stem cellular structure!! Fabulous!!
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myxomycota · 18 days
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Stemonitopsis typhina
by Kevin Moldenhauer
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mossinformed · 4 months
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Mosses have teeth : )
So instead of flowers -which came hundreds of millions of years after mosses- mosses have capsules to hold spores. A little hat pops off the top of the capsule and you get these swirly sparkly structures that help scatter spores like a salt shaker! Those are the peristome “teeth”. The word “stoma” in peristome means mouth.
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mosslovr · 2 years
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i love you moss i love you liverworts i love you hornworts i love you nonvascular plants i love you bryophytes
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