Its amazing what you can find in the hollows between the hills in the Scottish Borders, and Thursday’s hollow was Gattonside Moss, situated not far north of the village of Gattonside, but totally hidden from the village by the crinkles of the landscape. In fact these crinkles are generally well hidden from many of the roads in the area, from where they just look like single hills rising upwards into an upland mass and yet they are situated in the heart of the Scottish Borders, where agriculture is still intensive.
Gattonside Moss – 30 August 2012 (Copyright Carol Jones)
As for Gattonside Moss this is one of my favourites – its a long, narrow valley mire, that has some amazing carpets of Sphagnum moss, a central area of Willow carr and areas of floating rafts of vegetation, formed of Bog Bean and Marsh Cinquefoil rhizomes, though all of which is a good scattering of sedges. These mire habitats then grade into a small outer band of Sharp-flowered Rush pasture that then rapidly fades into improved grassland that surrounds most of the site. That is apart from a small area where a more typical hydrosere of wet heath and acid grassland still grades away from the mire.
One of the many sights seen here, that really caught my eye at this late stage of the summer, were the long shoots that bare the single white flowers of the Grass of Parnassus (Parnassia palustris), that shone brightly amongst the browning of the late summer sedge stems and the bright green carpets of Sphagnum. Grass of Parnassus was named by the first century Greek physician Dioscorides when he found it growing on the slopes of Mount Parnassus. Even though it is neither a grass or grass-like, I think it is somewhat special. It is a plant of heart shape leaves from which sprout long flowering stems, that hold single white flowers high above the surrounding vegetation. These flowers are formed of five white petals, each strongly marked by grey blue veins. In the centre of which, you find five normal stamens that alternate with five strange fringed stamens. These fringed stamens support a number of yellow glands on their tips. Then in the centre is the a superior ovary, which will eventually swell to form the fruiting capsule. On Thursday, these flowers where the centre for the local insect population activities, particularly a large variety of hoverflies that found them irresistible and reminded me that it really is summer, even when its been so wet.
Grass of Parnassus (Parnassia palustris) – 30 August 2012 (Copyright Carol Jones)
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