Chasmophyte

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Sea fennel ( Crithmum maritimum ), a chasmophyte

A chasmophyte or long chasmochomophyte ( ancient Greek χάσμα chasma 'earth column ' and φυτόν phyton 'plant') is a plant that grows in rock crevices. Chasmophytes use the cleft humus that collects there. The shorter and now more common term chasmophyte was introduced by Max Oettli in 1903 .

The crevices are mainly caused by freezing water penetrating into the rock, the crevice frost intensifies the detachment of rock and very often not only small terraces arise there, but smaller or larger crevices purely due to the detachment or the action of the freezing water.

literature

  • Ernst Wetter: Ecology of the rock flora of low-calcium rocks . St. Gallen 1918 ( pdf ).
  • Oettli: Contributions to the ecology of the rock flora . In: yearbook of st. Gallic Scientific Society . 1903.