On a blustery, showery day nipping out between blasts and downpours for bits of moss seemed like a reasonable idea. If I have identified the ones below correctly, they are numbers 29 and 14 (because of an earlier confusion) of my moss list, 209 and 208 of my boggybraewild list.
Thickpoint Grimmia/Schistidium crassipilum
(I think!)
I've spent quite a while trying to ascertain if this is Thickpoint Grimmia or some other moss. The description of it in the British Bryological Society guide (ISBN 978-0-9561310-1-0) does say that "neighbouring colonies" may look quite different from each other and possibly be confused with other species. So that's my excuse!
Here it is growing on a concrete step. Elsewhere on a brick. That's good as the book also says: "this species can be found throughout the country in man-made habitats".
To the right I've tried to show "the capsules largely hidden by the leaves that sheath them", which is, apparently, 'characteristic of' Schistidium species.
I also established that the Boggy Brae specimens have 16 peristome teeth which are sometimes reflexed on old capsules and sometimes not.
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Cypress-leaved Plait-moss/Hypnum cupressiforme
This little moss community is at the base of the dry stone wall that runs across our front terrace. This stone is facing south-east.
The Cypress-leaved Plait-moss is at top at the right-hand end. The moss at the top in the middle is a different species.
Hypnum cupressiforme/
Cypress-leaved Plait-moss growing on a dry stone wall
With some reflexed stonecrop that has not produced flowers this year. It usually does. Perhaps the weather wasn't warm/dry/wet enough at the right time this year? You can see some of the golden brownness of the H.cupressiforme shoots that its near relative H.andoi lacks.
A shoot of Hypnum cupressiforme, a good five and a half centimetres long despite The Book saying that shoots of this moss are "typically about 2cm long". There are longer ones too. No wonder I get confused!
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