{"id":33313,"date":"2020-12-09T00:05:54","date_gmt":"2020-12-09T08:05:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/hakaimagazine.com\/?post_type=custom_news&p=33313"},"modified":"2020-12-11T09:18:42","modified_gmt":"2020-12-11T17:18:42","slug":"who-will-save-the-slender-yoke-moss","status":"publish","type":"custom_news","link":"https:\/\/hakaimagazine.com\/news\/who-will-save-the-slender-yoke-moss\/","title":{"rendered":"Who Will Save the Slender Yoke-Moss?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Somewhere on a single limestone cliff on Moresby Island in Haida Gwaii, British Columbia, a thoroughly forgettable moss is in danger of dying out. Of course, it\u2019s not the moss\u2019s fault that it\u2019s forgettable, nor that it\u2019s at risk. Yet Zygodon gracilis, <\/em>the slender yoke-moss, is a drab little thing, at least as it appears on the limestone\u2014as a slimy black tangle with occasional pea-colored tufts. Even if you were lucky enough to chance upon it, you might not even notice it was alive.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s got no medicinal value and no cultural value,\u201d says Karen Golinski, a botanist at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History and curator at the herbarium of the University of British Columbia, who visited the moss in 2018.<\/p>\n

But with ecosystems collapsing all around, is survival something we offer only to conventionally attractive plants like roses and redwoods, or plants that we hope could cure cancer?<\/p>\n

The morose moss on Moresby Island is the only known colony of Z. gracilis<\/em> in North America (the species is found in some places in Europe). Haida Gwaii\u2019s temperate rainforest is the perfect place for mosses, rare and common, to sip on coastal fog. \u201cIf you\u2019re a moss person,\u201d says Ren\u00e9 Belland, a bryologist at the University of Alberta, \u201cit\u2019s moss heaven.\u201d Belland also chairs the mosses and lichens group at the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada (COSEWIC), which recently listed the species as endangered.<\/p>\n

The Zygodon<\/em> patch, first discovered by bryologist Wilf Schofield in 1961, has eked out a simple, solitary life. It\u2014or they, as individuality is confusing with mosses\u2014reproduces asexually. Without the spores of another colony, the patch maintains itself but does not expand, sputtering out new shoots when old ones die. It soaks in the rays of the sun and traps moisture from the air. It lives with no agenda, out of sight of the logging camp nearby, which was decommissioned decades ago and is now being swallowed up by forest. For more than 60 years, this life was enough.<\/p>\n

But now, Zygodon<\/em>, as the kids say, is not doing so hot. Its ailing state is not obvious; there are no spurts of blood, rotting branches, or mysterious pustules that might connote malady in a more charismatic creature. Instead, the moss\u2019s telltale sign of woe is its glum, grayish hue, a waxen appearance that comes from ferns and algae that have crept over it. All of this is due to the most banal of threats: an encroaching patch of young trees has sprouted up nearby, and is now providing a smattering of shade. Although many mosses would welcome it, this newfound shade means Zygodon<\/em> no longer has enough light for photosynthesis. \u201cIf this goes on too long, the algae will choke out the moss,\u201d Belland says.<\/p>\n

The moss is already almost unrecognizable. When Golinski visited Haida Gwaii in 2017, armed with Schofield\u2019s notes regarding Zygodon<\/em>\u2019s location, she couldn\u2019t find it. The moss only surfaced when Golinski returned the following year with Wynne Miles, a retired bryologist and former student of Schofield\u2019s, who climbed the limestone cliff and spotted what appeared to be a blackish fungus. When Miles spritzed it with water, the black splotch bloomed bright and green. \u201cIf you spray a moss, they open like this and curl out,\u201d Miles says over Skype, unfurling her fingers. \u201cIt was like a treasure hunt, and I had finally found the treasure.\u201d<\/p>\n