Leucobryum glaucum

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Leucobryum glaucum
(Hedw.) Ångstr.

The first of a double bill of Leucobryum glaucum photographs from Robin Stevenson. Tim Blackstock comments that this shows ‘dense rhizoidal heads that develop over unfertilised perichaetia in female cushions of Leucobyum glaucum’. In his paper in J. Bryol of 1987 (14, 535-541) Tim states that in female cushions of both L. glaucum & L. juniperoideum ‘dense tufts of rhizoids form from the dorsal surfaces of inner perichaetial leaves and give rise to distinctive heads, very similar to those that you photographed. They develop on barren perichaetia but not on those with sporophytes. In both species, germinating Leucobryum spores and dwarf males were found in these rhizoidal heads but only rarely in other parts of the large female cushions. They thus seem to provide a specialist female means of attracting males, some of which grow into larger gametophytes’.

Published: 1 January 2016