THE BRYOPHYTES OF CORNWALL
AND THE ISLES OF SCILLY

Photo by Dr M Lueth ©.

*1: Gulval nearPenzance, 1838, JR (TRU) (Paton 1969a: 742).

*2: Bodmin, before 1907, RVT (B) (Paton 1969a: 742).

Notes on habitats in C&S are as follows. Common both as an epiphyte and on rock or masonry. As epiphyte, commonest on Elder, frequent on Alder, Ash, Grey Willow, Sycamore; few records from Apple, Blackthorn, Buddleja, Cortaderia, Cupressus macrocarpa, elms, Gorse, hybrid poplars, oak, Traveller's Joy, White Willow. Like other Orthotrichum, epiphytic plants prefer bark of horizontal or inclined branches or trunks to that on vertical ones, and they avoid sites with heavy shade year-round (although tolerating considerable shade in summer). Commoner overall than any of its congeners, and often found in more exposed places than those tolerated by O. affine or O. pulchellum (e.g. on bushes on hillsides, and on bushes on tops of exposed sea-cliffs). Frequent in areas of arable agriculture, even occurring on Elders in hedgerows between arable fields where high nutrient levels apparently exclude all other epiphytic bryophytes. Also frequent on silted bark within flood-zone of R. Tamar and large streams and recorded at upper edge of inundation zone beside Stithians Reservoir.

Also common on dry calcareous masonry (old and not so old concrete and mortar), including walls, ruins, bridges, graves, concrete fence-posts, a reservoir dam, masonry debris, etc., where it grows on horizontal, vertical or inclined surfaces, in unshaded or partly shaded places. Few records also from serpentinite (natural boulders, on heath and by pool), gabbro (natural boulder close to coast), a gravestone and cliff bases of acidic rock, and several on granite boulders or granite in walls. Unusual records also on old tarmac of edge of tracks on coastal heaths (two records, both cfr) and on thin hard soil and concrete dried onto metal of farm roller parked at edge of field (many tufts, cfr).

Associates when growing as an epiphyte are essentially those listed as associates for O. affine; including Cololejeunea minutissima, Cryphaea heteromalla, Orthotrichum tenellum, Syntrichia laevipila, Ulota phyllantha, Zygodon conoideus, Zygodon viridissimus var. viridissimus; also a record with Syntrichia papillosa. Associates when growing on concrete or mortar are much like those listed for O. anomalum, including Schistidium crassipilum, Syntrichia montana, Syntrichia laevipila, Tortula muralis.