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Barbilophozia attenuata (Mart.) Loeske

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A lowland to subalpine liverwort , apparently confined to areas with an annual rainfall in excess of 750mm and forming pure patches or creeping through other bryophytes on moderately acid, base poor substrates, - as short un-branched shoots up to 4cm long, with asymmetric, patent, slightly obliquely inserted  3-lobed leaves, the cells having obvious trigones (corner thickenings). It also produces attenuated shoots with closely imbricated leaves  that bud off numerous angular green gemmae from their edges. Dioecious, but capsules only seen once in Britain.There is a small scatter of localities outside the high rainfall areas, 3 in Norfolk, one in Essex and one formerly in Herts.  Our only known Essex colony, first located by Eric Saunders in 1962 Trans.Brit.Bryo.Soc. 4: 485. occurs on Court Hill in Great Monk Wood, Epping Forest. He found it growing amongst Leucobryum on a stump 'nr. Bellringer's Hollow' and it was subsequently refound as an extensive patch around 10-15m across on the slumped Bagshot Beds eastern bank of Loughton Brook growing among the interstices of a Leucobryum patch by Ken Adams in March 1979 TQ4240-1,9802-3, It overwinters embedded in the Leucobryum where it is inconspicuous until its pale shoots emerge in the spring, and I suspect that the water sequestered in the Leucobryum keeps it moist over our droughty summers. It has persisted there in more or less the same area for 40 years. A detailed map of the site (below) was made in 2003-2004. Abundant with several pure patches. January 2012. KJA.