Studies on the ecology of the vegetation at Mawson Statio Antarctica

Abstract

The flora of Mawson Rock is fairly depauperate; the two commonest lichens are Buellia frigida and Caloplaca elegans and the only two mosses are Bryum algens and Grimmia lawiana. The lichens form open colonies on exposed rock, and closed patches on sheltered aspects. The mossfields are small and confined chiefly to gravels on northerly aspects receiving snow-bank melt waters. The moss colonies form cushions, turfs or hummocks and may be contorted by cryoturbic processes. Larger colonies thus contain greater cores of sand and gravel. Mature cushions of Bryum algens are up to 25 years old, but the deepest peats are certainly much older. The small biomass of green moss in the most sheltered sites at Mawson is similar to comparable mossfields on the exposed plateau of subantarctic Macquarie Island.