Additions to the Pendine list

I wandered slightly off my watching brief at Pendine today and found a few local rarities new to the range. There were a few cushions of Grimmia orbicularis alongside G. pulvinata on the sloping concrete block pictured above. The only other county record is from a wall in Llandeilo; there is only one site in Pembrokeshire on natural limestone. Also on the same block was a Schistidium that I'm still grappling with - I don't have Nyholm's flora and I don't think Smith would work on this genus even if the page in my copy wasn't torn. Using the key in the Iberian handbook it seems to fit S. helveticum, with short hairpoints and exothecial cells of varying shape and size. As a calcicolous species with a southern distribution this is maybe not too unlikely, but with only three other British records it'll need someone more qualified than me to pronounce on it (Sharon duly did, and unsurprisingly it was muticous crassipilum)

Schistidium, possibly helveticum

Old tarmac nearby had Syntrichia virescens, otherwise only recorded from three sites in Carmarthen town.  Tortula caucasica and Amblystegium serpens var. salinum were in disturbed damp sand. Plenty of Didymodon acutus on track edges too. There was also a good 500-thalli population of Petalophyllum in a new location here to justify my straying. This was right next to a location which had been used for storing piles of sea buckthorn prior to chipping and taking off to Port Talbot for biomass. Hard to say whether the petalwort was there before and the population has been slightly damaged by the areas still under a scattered woody mulch, or hadn't been there and has been encouraged by the telehandler and lorry movements. And, stopping briefly on another range on the way back out, another entirely new location for this liverwort.

Grimmia orbicularis

A new petalwort location