Contents Page 4 Introduction 5-6 Chapter 1; Large common liverworts

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Postscript; Spring 2003.
The first edition of this book was published in 1986. I printed 500 copies myself, and sold mainly to members of the British Bryological Society. By 1994, almost all had been sold, and I prepared a second edition. This postscript may perhaps serve as an apology to those who ordered a copy, of it, and who were disappointed.
The mid-nineties were an exciting time, bryologically. I had recently gathered - in some cases under Nature conservancy license - some of the rarest, most endangered and most spectacular of British mosses, notably Thamnobryum angustifolium, Bryum schleicheri var. latifolium, and Thamnium cataractarum, and had been sent other new species of outstanding interest, notably Zygodon obtusifolium, a new British species, and Paludella squarrosa, long thought extinct, but recently refound at its only known British site. Also, the two huge lime trees which had overshadowed the mosshouse were felled in 1995, and I could at last look forwards to it receiving sufficient light in the summer and autumn, to support better growth of the mosses inside it.
As a cactus grower, I had always been aware of the many other specialist societies, whose members far exceeded the number of active bryologists, and most of whom have always grown the plants that interested them. It was - and remains - my belief, that many more people would take an interest in mosses, that they would be more widely studied, and that their conservation would be more effectively achieved, were a tradition ever to become established of growing them, as I had long been doing.
Printing of the second edition of this book had been almost completed - sufficient to provide a hundred or so copies, at least, by the end of 1995, and I began by bringing them to the attention of the Hardy Plant society, and the Alpine Garden society. The book was reviewed positively, and a few orders were received.
Then disaster struck..

In the Spring of 1996, I was becoming increasingly absent-minded and erratic. In June, I was diagnosed as having a brain tumour, and spent six months in hospital. I was not, for a time, expected to survive, but was sent home, half blind and helpless, in December that year.

I have no clear memories of the time between 1995 and 2000, but it is plain that during those years I was unable to do anything useful in the garden or elsewhere, nor to tend the moss collection. My wife rang the late Dr. Watson, formerly of Reading university, who had long shown an interest in this collection. “What shall I do with them all?” she asked. “Keep on watering them” was his advice.
It was a forlorn task for a wife who had far more urgent preoccupations. It was also a hopeless task, for I had been unable to arrange any shading for the moss house since the year after the lime trees had been removed. For the next three years, they received the full force of the summer sun, with no ventilation or shading.

In the spring of 2000, I remember beginning to look in the mosshouse. I managed to replace a missing pane of glass, and to put up some shading. During that summer, I began to water the plants. I also remember a max.-min. thermometer hanging below an upper shelf, but not in direct sunshine, which had not been reset for some years. It had recorded a maximum of 182F. (83C.) Many seed trays and flower pots on the top south shelf, exposed to the full force of the sun, had become even hotter than this, and the plastic had been melted and deformed by the heat.

The mosses were, of course, in a sad condition. In 2001 I attempted to re-catalogue and replant all the survivors, but made little progress. However, a few new collections were made, and despite my damaged eyesight, I became aware that the moss flora of Reading had continued to change, and to improve. Some interesting Brachytheciums and epiphytes were refound, even around my home near the town centre.
In January 2002, having sold our Reading home, we moved to Frome, in Somerset. For two months, the mosses in their flower pots and seed trays were spread over the new lawn and garden, some of them covered with polythene. In March, they were put into their new and present home.
They are now in an aluminum greenhouse like the one in Reading, but set out on modular plastic shelves. They are in every way better situated than before, on the open north side of a tall hedge of Cupressus macrocarpa, which provides complete shade for 8 months of the year. That curse of suburbia has its uses! Summer shading in 2002 was like that in Reading, but a Norway maple to the east provided shade on summer mornings. The summer temperatures, by day and, more especially, by night, are lower here than in central Reading, the winters milder, rainfall and humidity are higher, and air pollution much lower. Fine large Orthotrichum species grow on trees nearby. The plants have responded dramatically. For the first time, in 2002, I kept almost all of them moist and growing throughout the summer, covered in polythene, and watered, as before, with a pump-up spray filled from a new water butt by the house. They started, or went on growing, all summer. In that autumn, I also re-catalogued the survivors, and started giving individual attention, replanting, etc., to the many that needed it. Growth continued in the winter, better than in previous years. Many plants, once feared lost, have now re-appeared, and the rarities collected or given in 1995, and mentioned above, all survive, though at present some are in very small quantity,
In March I went with a group from Headway, the association for people with brain injuries, to Florida. It was not a botanical excursion, and several of our party were wheelchair-bound, but even around the hotels and tourist sites, some mosses and a few hepatics could be found, mostly on trees. They have flourished in culture, their large green tufts providing a striking contrast to the surviving fragments in many of the older cultures around them.

I shall put some bryological material, including my accession catalogue and an up-to-date census of the living plants, on my website, later next year (2004), also a list of species of interest, mostly hepatics, which have been lost, and which I would like to grow again. I hope to regain sufficient health, for a few years at least, to restore the collection, and to enjoy tending it.

More important, my experience gives a dramatic warning of the dangers and shortcomings of relying on private collections for the long-term conservation of rare or endangered plants. I believe that a permanent, comprehensive, living collection of bryophytes - especially British ones - should be set up at an institution where the public can see them, where the interest of plantsmen and -women may be aroused by them, where methods of caring for them and propagating them can be refined and publicized, and where continuity of care can be assured for rare or endangered species, and for historic cultures.
I would be glad to assist with such a project in any way I can, and to make my own plants available, to help set it up.

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