MOSSES AND LIVERWORTS 73 



are either very common or, at any rate, are 

 not difficult to discover, and it may be of 

 interest to touch upon a few representative 

 species. One might say that it would be very 

 difficult to find a bog in which one or other of 

 the Sphagnum Mosses could not be found. 

 The most abundant of these is certainly the 

 Blunt-leaved Bog Moss (S. obtusifolium) . This 

 species is a large moss with short clustering 

 branches, and, like so many of these bog mosses, 

 grows in great masses in damp situations. The 

 individual stems are of a weakly habit, but 

 they gain sufficient support by leaning against 

 one another. It is only during its early days 

 that the Bog Moss has any attaching fibres. 

 The " flowers " are produced at the summit 

 of the shoots, and the female processes give 

 rise to small stalked spore cases. Another 

 very common Bog Moss is the Slender Bog 

 Moss (S. acutifolium) , a tall kind which is often 

 whitish in colour, and tinged with pink. It 

 can be readily distinguished from the preced- 

 ing species by its delicate habit of growth. The 

 floating Bog Moss (S. cuspidatum) is of some- 

 what similar appearance, though when, as is 

 often the case, it grows more or less submerged 



