*1: Penzance, 1844, AG
(PNZ) (Paton 1969a:
731).
*2: Coombe Hawne near
Fowey, 1906, RWS (TRU) (Paton 1969a:
731).
Unidentifiable immature plants likely to be this
species have been seen repeatedly in arable fields in winter.
Since it cannot be distinguished from Physcomitrium
pyriforme until the calyptra (great care needed!) or
operculum are well developed (During 1973, Smith 1978: 344)
there can be little doubt that it has been under-recorded to a
significant extent.
Grows mainly in small rather dense to open patches,
less often as scattered plants, or forming low turfs of small
extent. A colonist of bare soil (clayey, loamy or gritty; of
mildly acidic to circumneutral reaction; avoiding both dry and
really wet substrates; unshaded or less often partly shaded).
Most records are from soil of arable fields (cereal stubble,
cabbages, bulb-field edge and an old bulb field), others from
soil patches exposed in a pasture and a re-sown grass-ley.
Single records also from steep bank of small stream above
sea-cliffs, a bank near old mine-spoil and dumped soil near
quarries. Associates recorded were Barbula convoluta, Bryum dichotomum, Bryum rubens, Bryum violaceum, Trichodon cylindricus,
Dicranella
schreberiana, Dicrllanella
staphylina, Oxyrrhynchium hians,
Fossombronia pusilla, Funaria hygrometrica,
Phaeoceros laevis,
Physcomitrium
pyriforme, Pseudephemerum
nitidum, Riccia
sorocarpa, Riccia
subbifurca, Sphaerocarpos sp., Phascum cuspidatum, Tortula truncata, and
herbs (including Cerastium glomeratum,
Lamium purpureum,
Stellaria media, Veronica
persica).
Only recorded with well-grown capsules, but almost
all but very young plants evidently bear sporophytes. Capsules
immature 2-4, 7; dehiscing 3,
4.
