Bryolog 10 (27 November 2017)
Upcoming
As a general policy, check the website for event updates before you walk out the door!
- Register now for SO BE FREE, in southern Oregon from Saturday to Tuesday 24-27 March 2018.
- On 29 November 5-8 pm, learn about moss identification at the Mendocino College Coast Center, room 120. This workshop is for the meticulous botanist or nature enthusiast who is not averse to dichotomous keys, dissection of small plants, and hunching over a microscope. The session will be led by Teresa Sholars and Hayley Ross. To sign up, please contact hayleyhross@gmail.com.
- On 13 December, 1-3 pm, Kiamara Ludwig will introduce bryophyte basics to the docents of Tilden Park. If interested, email kludwig@ebparks.org.
- Open microscope day on Saturday 13 January 9:00-4:00 at Cal State Northridge, Chaparral Hall 5335.
- Neil Uelman and Paul Wilson will lead a beginner bryophyte walk on Sunday 21 January, starting at 9:00 at the San Juan Trailhead off of Ortega Highway. This is a site on the border between the Orange County Chapter and the Riverside/San Bernardino Chapter.
- Jim Shevock will be giving a talk to the Kern County Chapter on Thursday 18 January and leading a walk on Saturday 20 January, 2018.
- “Bryophytes of the Garden” will be presented by Caleb Caswell-Levy and Kiamara Ludwig at Tilden Park on 11 February 9:30-3:30, meeting at the visitor center. In the morning, participants will learn about basic bryophyte biology, and the basic structure of bryophytes along with taxonomically useful characteristics. This will be followed be a walk in the garden to learn to identify the major bryophyte groups, and in the afternoon, hand lenses and microscopes will be used along with the California Mosses book. Price $30-35 going to East Bay Regional Parks.
- Brent Mishler will be giving a talk entitled “Mosses are from Mars, Vascular Plants are from Venus” for the Milo Baker Chapter on 20 February 2018 at 7:30 pm at the Luther Burbank Art and Garden Center, 2050 Yulupa Avenue, Santa Rosa.
- Amanda Heinrich will be teaching a 2.5 hour introductory class on bryophytes at the Santa Barbara Botanic Garden on Saturday 17 February 2018, 10:00 am-12:30 pm.
- Amanda Heinrich will lead a beginner bryophyte walk at the Cozy Dell trail on Highway 33, just North of Ojai in Ventura County on 24 February 2018 at 9 am. Bring a hand lens and a snack. The Channel Islands Chapter is co-sponsoring.
- Hayley Ross will be leading a moss walk at the Jughandle Ecological Reserve between Fort Bragg and Mendocino on Sunday 28 January 2018, 10 am-1 pm. Meet at the Jughandle parking lot on Highway 1. If weather is terrible, walk will be postponed to Sunday 4 February, 10 am-1 pm.
- Kerry Heise and Marisela de Santa Anna will lead a walk on Saturday 27 January 2018 at Montgomery Woods State Natural Reserve in Mendocino County. They will focus on mosses and lichens en route to the grove of towering old-growth redwood. Bring a hand lens, water, and snacks. Meet at the west end of the Raley’s supermarket parking lot in Ukiah at 9 am, or 10 am at the trailhead on Orr’s Spring Road. Trip will go to 2 pm. Heavy rain will cancel trip. Call Kerry at 707-489-1500 to confirm. Kerry is also setting up monthly bryophyte/lichen identification sessions in Ukiah. More information will be posted soon on https://sanhedrin.cnps.org.
Quarterly Report
- Judy Harpel is our Rare Bryophyte Chair. More …
- Brent Mishler and Kiamara Ludwig will be sworn in as President Elect and Treasurer at the first of the year. We thank outgoing officers Paul Wilson and David Hutton for their service.
Timeless Bits
- Look for Archidium crassicostatum, a rare (or perhaps, overlooked) moss. More…
- Daniel H. Norris died on 30 September 2017. More…
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Rare Bryophyte Chair
Dr. Judy Harpel is now installed as Rare Bryophyte Chair. As such, she will be leading the Chapter’s efforts to inventory rare bryophytes and guiding our development of human infrastructure to make sure that rare bryophytes can be treated like other rare plants in California.
Dr. Harpel is an author of Rare Bryophytes of Oregon and adjunct curator of bryophytes at the University of British Columbia. For more than two decades she has been one of the major leaders in the inclusion of bryophytes under the rules of the Northwest Forest Plan. For much of this time she worked for the Forest Service.
Earlier Dr. Harpel did her Ph.D. work under Wilf Schofield. Her dissertation was entitled, The phytogeography and ecology of the mosses within the San Juan Islands, Washington State. Dr. Harpel did her master’s thesis as a student of Marion Harthill and her thesis was entitled, A preliminary floristic study of the mosses in the San Jacinto Mountains.
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Additional Localities for Archidium crassicostatum
—David Toren
When Archidium crassicostatum was described (Toren et al. 2016), this very inconspicuous moss was known only from Lake and Santa Cruz Counties. Subsequently, collections have been documented from Yuba County (L. Janeway 9635 CAS) and San Diego County (A. Pigniolo 1948A CAS). These collections have considerably expanded its known distribution. Two additional populations were documented for Lake County in the Spring of 2017, both within four miles of the type locality (D. Toren 10465, 10476 CAS).
The most common associates of A. crassicostatum are Ceratodon purpureus and Pleuridium acuminatum. These three mosses can form intricately mixed populations, causing confusion especially when sterile. Closer inspection shows that A. crassicostatum has incurved leaf margins, whereas those of Ceratodon are recurved. Pleuridium acuminatum can be distinguished from A. crassicostatum by its narrower, more linear leaves which taper to a fine tip and its ovoid rather than spherical capsule. In the field, dry plants of A. crassicostatum can sometimes have the same coloration as small, sterile tufts of Ceratodon. Consequently, the plants may be ignored and not collected.
Under the dissecting microscope, two somewhat subtle characters not mentioned in the original description may aid in the recognition of A. crassicostatum. First, the stem exhibits a slight succulence. Secondly, these stems are not truly straight but grow in a somewhat zigzag pattern. These characters are more obvious on longer shoots from which the leaves have been removed. While making these observations, the telltale fleshy regenerative shoots should also be found. It is apparent that A. crassicostatum is very likely to be more widely distributed in California than current collections would indicate, especially in oak woodland and chaparral areas at low elevations. With more intensive searching on hands and knees, it is highly probable that A. crassicostatum will be discovered in additional California counties.
Note: A. crassicostatum is the only species of the genus in California. The reports of A. alternifolium and/or A. donnellii in an earlier Bryolog are erroneous; they are based on the new species, A. crassicostatum.
The original description can be found in “Archidium crassicostatum (Archidiaceae), A New and Long-Overlooked Species From California, U.S.A.” by David R. Toren, Kenneth M. Kellman, and James R. Shevock (2016: Madroño 63: 348-352)
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Daniel Howard Norris (1933 –2017)
Dan Norris died on 30 September after a long period of being debilitated by Parkinson’s disease. For two decades before that he worked without pay as Curator of Bryophytes at UC Berkeley. Dan said that one should be a little bit obsessive about one’s group. He believed alpha taxonomy was the foundation of his sort of biology. Many reasons and examples were given. Before Dan’s work without pay, he was a professor at Humboldt State University for three decades. “He was an expert in his field, easy to understand, took us outside a lot, which was a magic ingredient in itself, and Dan was the kindest specimen of the human species,” says Paul Wilson. Dan was very fond of developing evolutionary hypotheses, which he demurely called “half-baked ideas”. Most of those in our chapter who are knowledgeable of moss taxonomy learned some of their bryology from Dan or from those who had learned from Dan. In addition to Dan’s work on California mosses, he was a leader in exploring the bryoflora of Papua New Guinea. He is survived by about 116,000 specimens mostly at UC and H.
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