Stiff-leaved woman's hair
| Stiff-leaved woman's hair | ||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Polytrichum strictum |
||||||||||||
| Systematics | ||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||
| Scientific name | ||||||||||||
| Polytrichum strictum | ||||||||||||
| Brid. |
The Steifblättrige women hair moss ( Polytrichum strictum ) is a moss from the genus of Polytrichum .
use
The moss was previously used to make brushes and small house brooms. Subfossil finds also indicate a possible ritual use as a good luck charm. The moss is also known under the German name Steifblättriges Widertonmoos , because of its use as a remedy against evil spirits. Often it was used to plug up cracks in houses so as not to let evil spirits slip into them. The moss also plays an important role in Japanese moss gardens.
features
The stiff-leaved female hair forms 10 to 15 cm high, mostly dense lawns. It can be easily distinguished from other red mosses by its whitish rhizoid felt. The simple trunks have close-fitting leaves when dry, but stick out when wet. The whole-edged leaves are 4 to 6 mm long and have a central rib protruding as a spike tip. The leaf margins are struck.
The 3 to 8 cm long Seta carries an approximately 3 mm long capsule, which is often only slightly longer than it is wide. The capsule hood ( Kalyptra ) is dense and long-haired. The protonema is extremely short-lived.
meaning
The male plants of the diocese deciduous moss form special summit, bowl-shaped antheridia in which rainwater collects. There are small spheres at the bottom. These are the male sex cell containers that burst open when mature and release (male) spermatozoids. These are rinsed out by raindrops or sprayed up to 10 cm. They swim chemotactically attracted to the egg cells in the (female) archegonia . The bowls can later be "grown through" so that a storey-like structure is created. Young plants grow on older ones. As a result, the numerous plants can develop bults up to 0.5 m high. The moss is also a strong indicator of dehydration.
The direction of the assimilates takes place within the stems. Outside, on the other hand, a water pipe can usually be found via the capillary spaces between the leaf sheaths. Due to swelling processes, leaf movements can be possible even with dead plants. The chlorophyll- containing lamellae of the leaf veins are water-repellent due to wax deposits. This promotes gas exchange in the spaces between the lamellae. Such a strong differentiation can otherwise only be found in flowering plants.
Occurrence
The stiff-leaved lady's hair moss grows particularly often on other peat mosses in raised bogs . However, it also colonizes other moist, soil or water acidic, boggy locations. It can be found from the lowlands to the subalpine level and is rarely absent in the larger moors of Central Europe. It has a Holarctic distribution and is also found disjointly in sub-Antarctic South America.
literature
- Ruprecht Düll : Excursion pocket book of the mosses. An introduction to moss science with special consideration of the biology and ecology of the most important mosses in Germany and for the magnification of the easily recognizable species in the area. 4th, improved, supplemented edition. IDH - Verlag für Bryologie und Ökologie, Bad Münstereifel 1993, ISBN 3-925425-00-4 .
- Volkmar Wirth , Ruprecht Düll : Color Atlas of Lichen and Moss. Ulmer, Stuttgart (Hohenheim) 2000, ISBN 3-8001-3517-5 .
- Jan-Peter Frahm , Wolfgang Frey : Moosflora (= UTB . 1250). 4th, revised and expanded edition. Ulmer, Stuttgart 2004, ISBN 3-8252-1250-5 .
