Common hedgehog hood moss
| Common hedgehog hood moss | ||||||||||||
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Common hedgehog hood moss ( Metzgeria furcata ) |
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| Scientific name | ||||||||||||
| Metzgeria furcata | ||||||||||||
| ( L. ) Dum. |
The common porcupine moss ( Metzgeria furcata ) is the most common species of the liverwort genus Metzgeria in Central Europe . It can easily be confused with some Riccia liverworts, but it colonizes clearly dry locations and has a central rib that can be seen with a magnifying glass.
Identifying features
The about 0.3 to 1.4 mm wide and up to 2 cm long, forked branched thalli are fresh green to yellowish green, dried white green in color. At first they are often close to the ground, only when the plants are more fully grown do the thallus tips protrude somewhat from the ground. Characteristic are the many tongue-shaped, linear adventitious shoots that fall off easily and are useful for the liverwort for vegetative reproduction. They are formed by the peripheral cells of the lamina . Individual hairs are only sparsely distributed on the edges of the thallus, these are also occasionally present on the underside. The lamina cells are about 30 to 60 µm in diameter. The dioecious liverwort, however, forms sporophytes very rarely .
Distribution and location requirements
Metzgeria furcata is a primarily epiphytic liverwort, which colonizes base-rich to weakly acidic, shady to light, dry to fresh locations on the bark, especially of deciduous trees and shrubs, as well as conifers. It is less common to find it on bare tree roots or on rock. It is a pioneering moss that is quickly overgrown by other stronger mosses. The species is common in the entire temperate latitudes of the northern hemisphere as well as in Australia and New Zealand , especially in areas with not too low humidity. However, its populations have decreased somewhat in Central Europe due to air pollution in recent years.
literature
- Urania plant kingdom . Volume 2: mosses, ferns, naked plants 1st edition 1992, Urania-Verlag, Leipzig 1992, ISBN 3-332-00495-6
- Jan-Peter Frahm, Wolfgang Frey: Moosflora. Verlag Eugen Ulmer, Stuttgart 1983, ISBN 3-8001-2463-7
- Wolfgang Frey, Jan-Peter Frahm, Eberhard Fischer, Wolfram Lobin: Small cryptogam flora. Volume IV: The Moss and Fern Plants of Europe. Gustav Fischer Verlag, Stuttgart, Jena, New York 1995, ISBN 3-437-30756-8
- Hans Martin Jahns : BLV identification book for ferns, mosses, lichens. BLV Verlagsgesellschaft mbH, Munich 1982, ISBN 3-405-11893-X
