Hi,
some of you seem to be interested in aquatic mosses. During a small trip by bicycle yesterday, I came to the “Marliner Bach”, a small brook in my region which leads into the Tollense river. There are almost no real aquatic plants in this small brook but then I found some rapids (man-made but it doesn’t matter). On the big rocks of the rapids I found an interesting looking moss. It’s Fontinalis antipyretica, you know it as Willow Moss. It is a native moss in my region but it is rare because it grows only on rocks/stones in smaller shady brooks. But in my region there not so many small brooks and there are almost no natural bigger stones in them, just fine sand. I heard that it should grow in lakes and ponds too but I never saw it in any lake in my region.
There are big bulks of this moss in the man-made rapids of the Marliner Bach. Oh, any moss-freak would drive crazy. I saw a stone with so much moss on it that looked like a perfect green ball of moss. It has approximately the size of a basket ball. Damn, it was too far away to take a good picture of it or to collect it. Here are some of the pictures of the moss in its natural habitat:

[img][650:490]http://people.freenet.de/r.gall/QuellmoosHabitat01.jpg[/img]

[img][650:490]http://people.freenet.de/r.gall/QuellmoosHabitat02.jpg[/img]

This is an other habitat about 100 meters upstream of the rapids:

[img][650:490]http://people.freenet.de/r.gall/QuellmoosHabitat03.jpg[/img]

The stones were smaller and there were much less moss. Don’t ask me what this bright green plant is. I don’t know it because I wasn’t able to collect it. I didn’t wanted to go into the water because it’s cold (about 14-17°C I guess) and about one till two feet deep. The current is strong but no as strong as it is in the rapids.

This picture shows a close-up view of the moss:



It’s stiff and much bigger than Java moss. I guess it’s Fontinalis antipyretica var. gigantea. Most of the moss was black and only the ends were green. It was really huge and there were relatively few algae.

Last time I visited this brook was in July and there was almost no moss on the rooks/stones, just lots of algae. I collected some of the moss from an other position upstream. But it started to rot, I guess my desinfection-solution (mix of malachite green and formalin) was too strong. This time I collect again some of it (only the green parts) and I was more careful. It’s still green, doesn’t smell yet and most of the worms and other invertebrates died. Hopefully it survives. There are thousands of small organisms like Gammarus spp. etc in the moss (you can see it on my last picture) but I just want to have the moss without any other living being. Some of these little creatures can be really harmful for small fishes or invertebrates, so a desinfection is useful.

I guess some of you also want to have this moss. I heard that you can’t buy real willow Moss in Singapore. But there are two big problems: at first, it needs cool water. In its natural habitat the water never becomes warmer than 22 or 23°C (it’s a shady little brook with a very strong current). So you must have a tank with cool water. 24-25°C shoud be the maximum temperature (this is what I read in the web). The other problem is the transport. Two of my Singaporean friends are pilots of Singapore Airline and we traded several times certain fishes etc., so to ask them to help us with the shipping is not a problem but they come only every once in a while to Frankfurt and I still haven’t asked them yet when their next flight to Western Europe or Frankfurt will be. The third problem is my National Service, which starts in less than two weeks. I won’t have the time to organise the shipping (or it’s a great effort for me because I’ll need the help of several family members). So, sorry guys, at the moment I can’t send you any of it, although I would do it if you are interested in. I’ll will ask my friends when they will come again to Frankfurt but the chance is very small that they will come this or next week.

Best regards

Robert