One of the most ancient inhabitants of our planet are numerous species of mosses and lichens, covering large areas. These plants are related to algae, but there are significant differences between them.
Lichen is a symbiosis of fungi and algae. Algae grow between the fungal fibers. This structure of the lichen body allows the plant to absorb moisture with the help of mushroom threads and process the minerals dissolved in it into organic substances with the help of green algae. Compared to mosses, lichens are more unpretentious, but dry out when there is a lack of moisture and die in the absence of light.
Mosses need shade and water, which is sucked out of the ground by special filamentous processes - rhizoids, which act as roots. Different types of mosses have different structures, but they all reproduce by spores. Water plays a key role in reproduction, because it is through it that male spores reach the female zygote and fertilize it.
All types of mosses reproduce with an intermediate stage - the formation of asexualplants - a protophyte, incapable of reproduction, on which a box with spores ripens. As a result of meiosis, spores germinate and form a protonema - a filamentous structure, which subsequently turns into a female or male plant - a gametophyte. Thus, there is an alternation of the sexual generation with the asexual.
Moss plants are conditionally divided into 3 classes:
1. Anthocerota. There are more than 300 species of mosses in this class, the main distribution zone is the tropics. Anthocerotic mosses have a peculiar structure - the genitals are located in the lower layer of the plant, which is a rosette from which an elongated pod-shaped sporogon protrudes, having eletars - threads that contribute to better dispersal of spores.
2. Liver mosses, represented by the subclasses Marchantium and Jungermannium. The first subclass includes plants whose gametophyte can be diverse in shape and has one oily body, and the sporogon is primitive and lacks a septum. Plants of the second subclass have several oil bodies and are very diverse in the shape of the gametophyte. Liverworts are especially common in the tropics and subtropics.
3. Leafy. Deciduous moss species number several tens of thousands (about 95% of all mosses) and include 3 subclasses: brium, sphagnum and andrei. Andreevs are small red-brown plants that grow on rocks. Sphagnum is characterized by the presence of a straight stem and a sporogon in the form of a spherical box. Brie mosses are very diverse, butall plants have special teeth for dispersing spores.
All deciduous have spread in forests and swamps, in the northern regions. The most famous are moss cuckoo flax, sphagnum, leucobria - types of moss, photos of which are found both in serious encyclopedias and in the collections of photographers.
Mosses play a huge role in the formation of biocenoses and in the formation of peat, which is used in industry. Moss is used to design the garden plots, which is easy to grow on your own using yeast, sugar, kefir and any part of the plants.
