The Lophocolea Stump

I've posted before (here, here, and here, the last one just now on 27Feb16) about the old spruce stump whose top is covered in the liverwort Lophocolea heterophylla (Variable-leaved Crestwort). Recently I noticed signs new activity on the stump.

The mat of Crestwort is quite thick now–it has been growing for a few years–but some dark patches appeared, and a small, darker green spot.

When I went to investigate, it appeared that something (a bird, looking for food, perhaps?) had pulled up some of the liverwort and dropped the pieces. There were also some bits of rotten wood. These break of at the edges very easily now.

The darker green spot is a different bryophyte, a moss I haven't identified yet, but which, on closer inspection revealed reflexed hair points at their tips.






There are other mosses, lichens, and sometimes slime moulds on the stump as new life grows on and around it and recycles its resources. Years ago, when it was just a bare stump, I wrapped a piece of hose around it. That's still there and part of the scenery. I've been reluctant to pull it off, not least because I'll have to find somewhere else to put it, but maybe I should before the spring growth of the grasses, heath bedstraw, ferns and rushes!

a frosted Polytrichum

Been trying a new way of loading photos. Hmm...