Known locally as southern club moss or ground cedar, this perennial plant has its roots to before the time of Methuselah. Its relatives were around at the time where insects were the dominant animals and when some of the club mosses were big tree like plants that occurred in the great carbon swamps that gave rise to the coal we now burn. Botantists often refer to the club mosses as seedless vascular plants because the plants reproduce via spores and have two stages in their life history, the sexual and asexual stages. In the asexual stage, which is tiny and inconspicuous and called the gametophyte (which probably exists below ground), the plant gathers nutrients and water with the assistance of micorrizhal fungi for up to 15 years underground. It then develops into the sporophyte or "adult" or parent plant that produces the spores for reproduction and this is the plant we observe in nature. Hence if you try to get this plant to reproduce from spores, it would take 15 to 20 years and you would have to have the correct microrrizhal fungus. Because it can't be grown from spores and it has a specific soil micorrizhal association, it can't be grown for the nursery trade. Unfortunately for years and years this plant has been collected from the wild to be grown in the garden only to discover it does not survive transplant and some estimates are less than 1% of dug plants survive. This led to the protection of the species in several locations throughout its range, which is pretty much the entire eastern United States. This plant has to be enjoyed in the woods in its natural habitat. Fortunately, this species is quite common in forested acid soils that are often rocky and usually nutrient poor in Kentucky. They are typically associated with upland pine and oak forests. These evergreen plants grow up to 6" in height along horizontal stems that are above ground. Each upright shoot along this stem produces lateral stems that are horizontal to the ground and have a fan like appearance. Each fertile stem will produce one or two cone-like spore producing structures (called strobili). Since these plants produce toxic alkaloids, they are not eaten by mammals, including humans. At one time the spores of these plants were used as a dusting powder by the pharmaceutical industry to package pills. There appears to be little other reference of using this species by people except collection for wreaths and other holiday greenery and mixing an elixir with a variety of other trees to produce a tonic to induce pregnancy.
Dear Dr. Thomas Barnes, Fascinating reading. There is a small colony of ground cedar growing in the forest near spring fed snow runoff sites in the hills near Fitchburg, MA. There are large glacial bounders here. I knew there was something about this plant that made it so special. Thank you for pointing out how the plant comes into being as an adult. How unique the club moss plant is. I have been doing independent study on mushrooms after learning about importance of mycelium in the soil from Paul Stamets. The forest where to ground cedar gorws is pine, maple and oak.
ReplyDeleteThere is a beautiful spread of ground cedar in our woods in western Carter County, Ky. A thin deer trail winds its way through the sea of green. Looks awesome in the melting snow.
ReplyDeleteThere is ground cedar in the woods near a cabin I have owned since 1975. When I first went there, a small patch of ground cedar was present, In recent years there has been increased growth; one area is especially lush and large- about 1000 square feet, I would guess. The growth seems to be especially strong near an area where I have burned brush off and on for about 35 years. I have wondered whether there is any connection. Do you have any reason to expect that wood ash would stimulate the growth of ground cedar? WGT
ReplyDeleteI suspect the repeated burning has depleted some of the nutrients in the soil and ultimately created better habitat because this plant grows in extremely poor nutrient soils.
ReplyDeleteAhah. It seems my line of thinking was off base. I wondered whether the windblown ash from the brush pile burnings was improving the soil nutrients, perhaps especially potassium, in the areas where the ground cedar is thriving. I see that my earlier note was unclear that it is growing downwind of the area where I have been burning; the burning area is bare ground.
ReplyDeleteThanks so much for responding. WGTucker