International Journal of Horticulture, 2015, Vol.5, No.19 1
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build up K, Mg, and Ca from precipitation, but they
do not contend for P in soil. After the accumulation of
these ensnared nutrients mosses release them slowly
to the soil. When mosses become dried out, their cell
membranes undergo damage, so when rehydrated
again, it becomes permeable due to leaky situation. It
normally takes about a daytime to fix this damage,
and during that time, the moss can pour out its
additional soluble contents, thus providing a number
of these nutrients to root zone of other plant during the
initial stages of precipitation. It is established that
bryophytes augment the safeguard ability of the soil,
predominantly in opposition to the alterations usually
caused by adding up of manure. The dawdling decay
of several bryophyte taxa makes them appropriate for
continuing mulch. When
Sphagnum
is spread over the
soil or mixed with top soil, it keeps dampness and
averts the growth of unwanted weeds. It also dejects
damping-off disease caused by fungi. Peat mosses
mixed with wastes obtained after fish-processing
supply a fertilizer better to sawdust and wood flakes in
preserving nitrogen, however, it is also more costly
(Ando, 1957; Bernier, 1992; Rao and Burns, 1990).
Culturing
For growing exotic ornamental ferns, orchids
(Adderley, 1965) and other bonsai, mosses are
particularly excellent Taxa like
Hypnum imponens
,
Leucobryum
spp.,
Camptothecium arenarium
,
Rhytidiopsis robusta
, and
Thuidium delicatulum
are
specially used for this reason.
Leucobryum
spp. is
used as a replacement for peat moss that encourages
good root initiation on cuttings of orchids. For the
enhanced and quality production of mushrooms,
Sungrow, Inc., has had a contract with the Campbell
(soup) corporation to grow mushrooms using a
mixture of
Sphagnum
spp.
Sphagnum
appears to be
indispensable in the method of air-layering. The moss
is coupled firmly with sheet of plastic in the specific
region of the stems to maintain wetness, encouraging
the expansion of adventitious roots. Pant (1989)
observed the use of such padding for grafting fruit
trees in western Himalayas. He also reported more
prolific bud and flower formation in
Fuchsia
and
Begonia
,
if the pots have a moss layer to take apart the
humus loaded top and the bed soil. Similar practice
has also perform in Japan, where for Rhododendron
cultivation, fragments of
Hypnum plumaeforme
,
Leucobryum bowringii
,
L. neilgherrense
, and rarely
L.
scabrum
are mixed with sand or soil (Ando, 1957).
Seed Beds
Use of bryophytes as seed beds offers both benefits
and troubles, because it may promote seed
germination, but as a side effect also inhibits survival
of seedlings. However, species of
Polytrichum
are
used as a carpet to promote germination pioneering
white spruce (
Picea glauca
) in Nova Scotia.
Conversely, a mixed mat of
Polytrichum
and
Cladonia
is too intense for
Populus
seed spread. As a result,
germination is failed because the lichen and moss mat
absorbs water too fast to permit satisfactory soaking
of seeds, beside this, recurrent dripping and
desiccation of surface soil causes the hardly any
thriving seedlings to lift. Actually, moss has been well
thought-out as a “pest” in the case of containers
growing of conifer seedlings, because it obstructs
juvenile seedlings by creating a contest for minerals
nutrients, and withdraws soil of water. One of the
problems seems to be that, in water deficit soils,
Sphagnum
peat has a high attraction for water,
providing deprived hydraulic conductance for
seedlings and shoot water potentials are poorer than
those obtained in sandy loam (Al-Kanani et al., 1992;
Bernier et al., 1995).
In
Picea mariana,
development of roots is pretty slow.
Roots are too undersized to get into the soil ahead of
the moss to attain nourishment (Al-Kanani et al., 1992;
Bernier et al., 1995). Conversely, in case of prairie
soils, cryptogamic crusts augment the establishment of
seedling. In such conditions,
Sphagnum
extracts
persuade germination of
Pinus banksiana
seeds, and
extracts of
Polytrichum commune
and
Sphagnum
spp.
encourage growth of Larix seedlings. Extracts of the
above mentioned moss taxa, on the other hand, inhibit
the growth of other pine and spruce seedlings. Some
of this control of germination may be due to the
production of IAA by these mosses, but under usual
conditions, it is uncertain if this phytohormone would
influence other plants. Nevertheless, when extracts of
mosses are applied, conflicting responses are observed
with different plant species. Bigger moss taxa, for
instance,
Pleurozium schreberi
supports seed
