May 2014 Desktop Calendar

This is another moss from my March trip to Yosemite National Park. Since I found it in a park, I don't have collection to help with the identification and it doesn't look like a species I encountered on the SOBEFREE foray. Thus I don't have an identification for this spectacular little plant. 

Does it look familiar to anyone? A pleurocarpous moss growing on granite in the Sierra Nevada mountains. If you have a guess please share it in the comments section. Thanks!

May Desktop Calendar

1 - Single click on the image to open it up in a new window. (If you use the image directly from the blog post you will lose a lot of resolution.)

2 - Right-click (or ctrl-click) on the image, and chose the option that says, "Set as Desktop Background" or "Use as Desktop Picture". The wording may vary.

3 - If the image does not fit your desktop neatly, you may have to adjust the image (Mac: System Preferences - Desktop and Screen Saver - Desktop; Windows: Control Panel - Display - Desktop) and choose "Fill screen" as the display mode of your background image.

April 2014 Desktop Calendar

This moss and lichen combo is from my trip last month to Yosemite National Park. I only did photographic collecting and I am still improving my California identifications, thus I was planning to post this calendar without species identifications. But after this weekend's SOBEFREE (a spring outing in California for professionals to head out into the field to observe, collect, and identify bryophytes) I am ready to take a guess.

From the photo this bryophyte appears to be Orthodicranum tauricum. This species may remind you a bit of Dicranum. They both have narrow thin leaves and upright stems. Unlike Dicranum, the leaves of Orthodicranum point in many directions. In Dicranum the leaves are falcate (meaning sickle-shaped) and secund (all pointed in the same direction). It gives Dicranum one of it's common names, broom moss. It looks like the floor has just been swept using a stem and the leaves are now curved and pointing all in the same direction. But I wouldn't recommend it for floor sweeping. It would take way to long to get the chores done.

Anyone have any thoughts on an identification for the lichen? Lichenological books are no longer at my fingertips in my lab here in California, but it would be great to learn the genus or species if someone is familiar.

April Desktop Calendar

1 - Single click on the image to open it up in a new window. (If you use the image directly from the blog post you will lose a lot of resolution.)

2 - Right-click (or ctrl-click) on the image, and chose the option that says, "Set as Desktop Background" or "Use as Desktop Picture". The wording may vary.

3 - If the image does not fit your desktop neatly, you may have to adjust the image (Mac: System Preferences - Desktop and Screen Saver - Desktop; Windows: Control Panel - Display - Desktop) and choose "Fill screen" as the display mode of your background image.

March 2014 Desktop Calendar at Yosemite

I took some time off this week and went camping in Yosemite National Park. It was my first time there and it was an amazing visit. Granite mountains, boulders covered in mosses, and tough trees clinging to cliffs. Yes, I mentioned rocks three times in the same sentence. Geology is everywhere in Yosemite! If I had grown up in the west, I am convinced I would have been a geologist rather than a botanist. The plant to rock ratio is skewed completely in the opposite direction from the eastern deciduous forests that I grew up surrounded by in the midwest. 

The geology of the Sierra Nevada Mountains is an interesting tale. The vast majority of the exposed rock is granite and was formed millions of years ago deep underground from magma. As time passed erosion of the layers above, glaciation, and uplifting exposed the upper layers of these rocks. Giving us literally translated from Spanish the "snowy mountain range" of the Sierra Nevada. 

Unfortunately for the water situation in California there was not much snow in the mountains when we visited last weekend. Just the tops retained a light dusting of snow and the vast majority of the trails were open and dry. If you are in the area I would highly recommend a visit to this lovely park. Just beware, Yosemite is one of the most highly visited national parks in the United States and I hear that the summer crowds can be intense, especially in the valley. 

Overall it was a much needed vacation and a spectacular piece of nature to visit. I was also very impressed by the accessibility of many of the waterfalls and nature trails. A number of them are paved with flat to mild grades. It is great to see a national park making all of its scenic treasures available to a wide audience!

Half Dome in Yosemite National Park

March Desktop Calendar

1 - Single click on the image to open it up in a new window. (If you use the image directly from the blog post you will lose a lot of resolution.)

2 - Right-click (or ctrl-click) on the image, and chose the option that says, "Set as Desktop Background" or "Use as Desktop Picture". The wording may vary.

3 - If the image does not fit your desktop neatly, you may have to adjust the image (Mac: System Preferences - Desktop and Screen Saver - Desktop; Windows: Control Panel - Display - Desktop) and choose "Fill screen" as the display mode of your background image.

Sequoia National Park Field Guide

These are the final two videos in the series Looking Down by Lena Coleman, a graduate student at California State University Northridge.

These two are photographic field guides that teach you to identify moss and liverwort species from the Sequoia National Park. I didn't count, but I would estimate that 60 species are covered between the two videos. They are organized first by elevation and then by the substrate on which they grow. Mostly the identifications are based on features of the leafy or thalloid gametophyte, but photos of the sporophytes are also shown. 

I think that it is a really nice guide and it definitely makes me want to get out and explore the bryophytes of California. However, I am not sure how I am going to take these guides out to the field with me. Does this mean that I have to break down and get a smartphone?

First Half

Second Half

Do you have a favorite species? Though Funaria hygrometrica is the species that I study for my laboratory research, I would have to say that my favorites of the bunch are the Fissidens species. Those opposite leaves that clasp around the leaf above are such a neat shape.

If there are any issues viewing the videos above they can also be watched here (first half) and here (second half). 

Mosses of Sequoia National Park

This video focuses on mosses of the Sequoia National Park in California. It is the first in a series of videos made by Lena Coleman, a graduate student at California State University Northridge. The images in the video are really great and it makes me want to get out for some hiking in the woods!

The video can be played by clicking on the video below or on YouTube through this link.

The music is nice but it is not one that I recognize. Can anyone name that tune?

Growing on Trees in Acadia National Park

My first volume of the journal Bryologist for 2012 has arrived. Thus, I am trying to finish up my reading of articles from 2011. The last one I had to read looked at the interaction between the rain/fog chemistry, the type of tree, and the lichens and bryophytes living on the trees.

Natalie L. Cleavitt, Holly A. Ewing, Kathleen C. Weathers, and Amanda M. Lindsey. 2011. Acidic atmospheric deposition interacts with tree type and impacts the cryptogamic epiphytes in Acadia National Park, Maine, USA. The Bryologist 114 (3): 570-582.

I have been asked several times about whether there are different types of bryophytes that grow on different types of trees. This study really got me thinking about the importance of substrates for bryophytes and lichens. 

Some of their findings...

- Sites with less acidic fog have higher epiphyte biomass.
- Spruce bark is generally more acidic (lower pH) than maple bark. 

(This is not something new but definitely something I want to keep in mind when talking to people about the pH of the bark of different species of trees.) 

- Fog sulfate content and bark pH were good predictors of macro-lichen composition.

vary along the length of a single trunk.

Overall it was a really cool study and I would highly recommend it if you are interested in thinking about the influence of polluted rain/fog on both lichens and bryophytes.

Hot off the Geothermal Presses

 I read this study in the latest issue of the International Journal of Plant Sciences. I thought that it was a really neat study and is an easily accessible piece of scientific literature for folks to read who are not professional bryologists.

The premise - In stressful environments, studies suggest that sexual reproduction is favored. Researchers examine this idea in mosses across a geothermal gradient in Lassen Volcanic National Park in California.

Methodology - They collected data on sporophyte and gametoecia production from species in the field. (Yeah, gametoecia. I had to look this word up. It is both the gametangia and the surrounding leaves together.) They also collected data on temperature. The collection locations were divided up into geothermal and nongeothermal sites based on the temperature measures.

Also they ran a common garden experiment with Pohlia nutans to look at whether a genetic adaptation was limiting sporophyte production or if alternatively the extreme stress was the cause of low sporophyte production.

Results - Their results indicate that there were lower rates of sporophyte production, due to lower rates of gametoecia formation at the geothermal sites. These rates for both sporophyte and gametoecia production were higher at the nongeothermal sites. When plants from both types of sites were grown in greenhouse conditions these relationships disappear.

Implications - This study does not support the idea that sexual reproduction is favored in stressful environments. It actually shows the complete opposite for this species of mosses. Sexual reproduction decreases with increased temperature stress. The authors state that the "regression between temperature and sporophyte production was not high." And go on to suggest that other stresses such as heavy metals may be involved. They discuss that other studies in fungi and mosses have shown similar patterns and cite several studies.

I was wondering whether they thought that differences in light or perhaps levels of desiccation could be an influence too.

Sarah M. Eppley, Todd N. Rosenstiel, Camille B. Graves and Estefanía Llaneza García. 2011. Limits to Sexual Reproduction in Geothermal Bryophytes International Journal of Plant Sciences Vol. 172, No. 7, pp. 870-878.

Overall I thought that it was a really great study and a nice read. One odd fact is that they list 3M Corporation as one of their funding sources in the acknowledgements. I use a lot of post-it-notes to label and organize my research. Wonder if I could get them to sponsor one of my studies?

Blogging Pause

October has been a busy month for me with a trip to Virginia and juggling a number of projects here in the lab. All the balls are still in the air and I am feeling pretty good about that. However as you can see the blogging has suffered, with my last post being over a month ago. I have been amassing ideas for new posts over the month and am planning to write some of those during the upcoming weekend.

For now...

- The latest edition of the plant blog carnival Berry Go Round is up at Beetles In The Bush (#21) for your perusal. My favorite article of the bunch was the post at The Natural Capital about wild grapes. It is a well written post with a good hook at the beginning. Then great facts on identifying wild grapes and tips on avoiding other fruiting plants that you might mistake for grapes.

- The trip to Virginia was to see a friend and former Grad Student from my department who now lives in Virginia. I left the shutter-bugging to the other gals so I don't have any pictures of our outing to the Shenandoah National Park. It was a great autumn day and there were tons of mosses to be seen! If you would like to see some photos and the tale of hiking adventures with four botanists you can check out Em's blog post here.

Mosses Featured at United States National Parks

I did a search recently because I was interested to see how many of our National Parks discuss or feature the mosses that live in the parks. Here are a few of the interesting pages that I found and my comments on them. (They are not arranged in any particular order.)

Mt Ranier National Park - Washington
In 1939 Dr. E. T. Bodenberg wrote a moss flora about this park. It has a really thorough introduction that covers everything from the moss life cycle to how particular features of the park affect the mosses growing there. A checklist of the mosses in the park and a key to their identification is also included. Also interesting to note is that samples of all of the species included in this flora have been collected and placed in the park's herbarium. A herbarium is a collection of dried plant samples associated with location information that acts as a natural history record of the plants from a particular area.

Denali National Park and Preserve - Alaska
This park has a very animated and detailed section about the mosses. They also include an informative list of reasons for bryophytes being so broadly distributed across the globe.

Arches National Park - Utah
This park has a really great page discussing desert mosses and their ability to survive long dry periods (aka. desiccation).

Cape Krusenstern National Monuemant - Alaska
Sphagnum sp. (peat moss) is mentioned as a major player in the tundra habitat that is dominant at this location.

Canyonlands National Park - Utah
This site pretty much reuses the same information and photo as those at Arches National Park. I think that it is all still applicable since the habitat in the two locations is probably very similar. However more bryophyte details specific to the park would have been appreciated.

Grand Teton National Park - Wyoming
This park has a really great page that highlights the mosses and liverworts and the role that they play in this park.

Shenandoah National Park - Virginia
This park quotes the number of bryophytes that they have growing at the park = 208 species of moss and 58 species of liverwort. They also list some references and website links for more bryophyte information. The websites look to have good information and are associated with major universities. I think that their liverwort book selection is good, while their moss recommendation is a 2 volume set that costs ~$300. I would recommend a library if you are interested in checking out this thorough work on mosses.
(Pet Peeve: Below the photo it describes the mosses as 'fruiting'. That term is commonly used but biologically incorrect. Bryophytes do not form flowers, seeds or fruits! But fruiting is an easier term to use than sporing, which is not a technical or even real term. It could just be said that they are reproducing.)

ParkWise - Educational Resources for Alaskan National Parks
Mosses are included as part of this exercise about successional plants.

Redwood National & State Parks - California
Bandelier National Monument - New Mexico
Both of these parks mention moss being used by birds as nesting material.

National Battlefield Park - Virginia
This park has a page with a nice photo that features the mosses and liverworts.

I hope that you enjoy these webpages about mosses and liverworts living at our National parks, preserves, and monuments. If you have any stories about the bryophytes at your local parks feel free to share them in the comments section.

Winter Mosses

A friend of mine recently moved to Virginia and on a hike in the Shenandoah National Park she spotted some mosses growing on boulders in the winter snow. Since I still have not taken any moss photos this winter, I decided to share hers on the blog.

This rock looks to have some type of Orthotrichaceae with brown sporophytes left over from last season. There also appears to be some Dicranum sp. in the lower left of the photo. These are just my best guess given what I can make out from the photo.

For this photo I am not sure what type of moss is in the lower center of the photo. Would anyone like to hazard a guess? As for the large patch of lighter green moss, I would bet money that is a species of Thuidium.

Thanks for sending the photos Em!

Mosses as Successional Plants

After a large scale disturbance such as a forest fire or glaciation, mosses are one of the initial colonizers of open soil. The website for the Glacial Bay National Park has a nice series of successional photos with mosses as the first stage. The mosses create a moist environment that can favor seed germination of the flowering plants that will come after the mosses.

The website for the National Parks of Alaska has a glacial successional exercise for students to carry out in the classroom. This exercise examines the interaction between glaciers and biological ecosystems. In part II the students make a "glacier" out of a large ice cube and expose plants to the cold and examine the effects. They suggest using Impatiens plants, but I think that mosses would be great to use as well.

I have found mosses very easy to grow in the lab. I either collect sporophytes and then sew the spores onto fresh soil. Or I take leafy gametophytes from the wild and grind them up in some water using a mortar and pestle. Then I pour the moss slurry onto the soil. With a lid and some plastic wrap, protonema start to grow in a couple of weeks and there are leafy gametophytes within a month. I am not sure if as dramatic a response to the cold would be seen with the mosses. Where it does become cold and snowy during the winter, the mosses stay bright green and alive beneath the snow pack. So it would be really interesting to see how they respond to cold without the insulating effects of a snow pack. Overall I think that it looked like a pretty cool exercise for teachers to use in the classroom.

Moss Fossils

Another national area with cool mosses is the Florissant Fossil Beds National Monument. It is located near Colorado Springs, Colorado and has some of the most diverse fossil beds in the world. Around 1700 different species have been described from this monument alone. Considering that fossilization is a chance event that requires very specific conditions, it is pretty amazing that this many species were preserved within a 6,000 acre area. Most of the fossilized plants and animals are from the Eocene epoch (one of the fancy names for dividing up the past into smaller chunks), which was approximately 55 to 34 million years ago (mya).

They have an online museum where they list some of the fossilized species along with their photos that have been found at the monument. Their fossil list would not be complete without mentioning the fossilized mosses. One of the species that they found is Plagiopodopsis cockerelliae (Cockerell's moss) and they have a very detailed photograph of the fossil posted online. This moss is really tiny. I think that the scale bar that they show is a centimeter long with the tick marks indicating millimeters. This fossil appears well preserved. Individual leaves and the sporophytes topped by calyptrae can be seen in the fossil. (A calyptra is a organ that grows from the leafy green maternal gametophyte. It covers the sporophyte during its development.) I think calyptrae are really neat organs. Studying their interaction with the developing sporophyte is the main focus of my PhD.

This fossil of Plagiopodopsis cockerelliae is a more recent fossil than many of those found at the Florissant Fossil Beds National Monument. It is from the Miocene epoch (23 to 5 mya). I guess recent is all relative. It is recent considering that mosses evolved around 400 mya. The age of this fossil is not mentioned on the website. I did some research and found this publication on fossil mosses that discusses Plagiopodopsis cockerelliae in more detail.

Steere, W. C. 1946. Cenozoic and Mesozoic Bryophytes of North America. American Midland Naturalist 36(2):298-324.


Some fun facts about Plagiopodopsis cockerelliae from the paper are below the fold.

1) This was the first fossil moss found with sporophytes in North America.

2) It was collected from the Florissant lake deposits by Professor and Mrs. T. D. A. Cockerell in 1906. Hence the common name (Cockerell's moss) and specific epithet (cockerelliae).

3)In 1915 E. G. Britton described the fossil genus Plagiopodopsis. She thought that it resembled the living moss Plagiopus, hence the similarities in the names. However in Steere's (1946) paper he mentions that the specimens of Plagiopodopsis that he has seen do not look like Plagiopus. Thus he is of the opinion that this fossil and living taxa are not closely related and the scientific names are misleading.

{This post is dedicated to my friends who are in love with Colorado Springs.}

Into the Depths of Crater Lake

I searched the National Parks websites for moss just to see how many of the other parks mention them. I was pleasantly surprised that quite a few of them talk about moss and other bryophytes that can be found in the parks. One of the interesting articles that I found was a report on the deep water plants that live in Crater Lake National Park, Oregon. They used a one-person submarine to explore the rock walls the lake for plant life. Crater Lake is the deepest lake in the United States at a depth of 1,943 feet (592 meters). And what do you think they found living 759 feet (253 meters) below the water's surface?

Well a moss of course! This finding extended the known depth to which mosses can grow by 100 meters and it is most likely the world record depth for a moss. The moss that they found was in the genus Drepanocladis (Drepanocladus - possible spelling error on their part?). This is a bit of old news, seeing as how this discovery was made in 1988. I am not sure if any mosses have been more recently found to grow deeper than this. If I find out that they have I will be sure to let you know.

I think that it is pretty cool that a moss can live and grow that far under water. However how in the world does it get enough light to photosynthesize? Water depths in the open-ocean are divided up into different zones depending on the amount of light that can penetrate the water. Photosynthesis occurs in the euphotic zone which is 0 to 660 feet (200 meters) in depth. The thing is these are numbers that apply to the open-ocean. Lakes are a different story and depending on the turbidity (haziness) of the water light might not be able to penetrate nearly as deep. So how in the world does this moss stay alive that far below the water's surface? At this point I am not sure, but if you have a hypothesis feel free to put it up in the comments section. I will keep thinking about this and if I have any ideas I will be sure to let you know.

Longing for Spring

I know that I have only been back from the warm climate of Costa Rica for a couple of weeks, but I am already tired of winter. (This photo was taken from the top of a mountain on a beautiful day in Costa Rica.) Today in Connecticut it was icky, slushy, raininess with overcast skies. Thus I am looking forward to summer and am already planning a weekend vacation escape. A lot of people head to the beach but I am not a big fan of sand. I would much rather go where there are woods, great views, and fun hiking trails. My current vacation dream spot is Acadia National Park in Maine. I visited with my family about 10 years ago and I would love to go back. I have great memories of hiking and climbing the rocky trails. Also we got up early one morning and watched the sunrise from the top of Cadillac Mountain .

"It is said that, at some times of the year, the sun touches the slopes of Cadillac Mountain before any other place in the United States. At 1,530 feet, Cadillac is the highest point along the North Atlantic seaboard." From the National Park Service website.

The National Park Service also has a blurb under the Plants Section for Acadia National Park entitled Mosses and Liverworts. Here is what they had to say about our bryophyte pals that live in the park

"If you find a bog in Acadia National Park you are sure to see sphagnum (pronounced “sfagnum”) moss. Mosses, like ferns, reproduce by spores. However, mosses don’t have well-developed conductive tissue and therefore cannot move water and nutrients throughout their systems as effectively as ferns and other vascular plants. Because of this, mosses by necessity always grow in low mats in wet areas close to their nutrient source.
Sphagnum species are common and come in shades of green, red, and brown. Bog hummocks, which are small mounds of sphagnum, often form to create an undulating bog surface. Each species of sphagnum finds its own niche based on levels of soil moisture.Therefore, the species of sphagnum growing on the top of the hummocks are usually different from the ones growing between the hummocks!"