A botanist working to identify thousands of tiny plants | My Garden Path | Gardening Australia
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- Опубліковано 28 сер 2024
- We meet a biologist who has spent his life observing the littlest living things; from pollen in the air to the moss under our feet. Subscribe 🔔 ab.co/GA-subscribe
Dr Andrew Thornhill is a research botanist at the State Herbarium of South Australia curating the bryophyte collection, including mosses, liverworts and hornworts. He also teaches plant identification at the University of Adelaide which is within walking distance via the botanic gardens.
Early in life, Dr Andrew knew he wanted to study living things and enrolled in university straight out of high school. Unfortunately, one week before studies began, Andrew discovered he had a rare form of cancer in his knee and was met with an option to amputate or go through a world-first surgery. He opted for the surgery, which was successful, though “it meant that I couldn’t run anymore, and I had to take care of my leg. It didn’t help that I was in a car accident five years after chemo. I broke both my legs and every bone in my foot, so I had to recover again.”
Despite having to defer his studies, Dr Andrew continued with a focus on plants instead of zoology, admitting that “it might be too hard to chase animals.” With moss being so close to the ground Andrew makes light of the ironies and compensations of his work. “When they made me the moss curator, it was kind of ironic because you have to get down on your knees. I don’t have one of the knees to get down on, so I get a camera or magnifying glass... and just lay on my stomach to look really closely.”
The collection holds 30,000 dry specimens which are being digitised into a database. Assisting Dr Andrew is environmental biology student Bonnie Newman who discovered four migrated species of bryophytes previously unseen in Adelaide via the iNaturalist app. Bonnie has volunteered with the herbarium collection for over two years and says, “Andrew has a really relaxed way of doing things, you know, cracking jokes and making people feel comfortable.” As well as the current collection, they also collect new specimens from the field which are pressed in tissue to extract moisture, frozen to get rid of pests then labelled and stored in the herbarium.
The First Creek wetland in Adelaide botanic gardens is a popular place to find moss, hornwort and liverwort. Andrew says it’s the combination of shade and consistent moisture that allows the mosses to survive even through dry Adelaide summers. “When they do (dry out), they sit there, and they don’t completely die. When it rains, they can pop up quickly and show themselves again.” Andrew points out a leafy liverwort which grows on rocks and logs, slowly decomposing them into soil, and performing a vital role in the ecosystem. “Mosses are doing a job, extracting nutrients, holding the soil together, slowly breaking something down. Without them, we wouldn’t have the soil that other plants can use.”
Moss outreach is also an important part of Andrew’s work, with trivia nights whimsically titled Mosstermind, art exhibitions and Moss Appreciation Society pages on social media all aiming to encourage more young scientists to the field of these mini but mighty plants.
Dr Andrew says, “Mosses and their close relatives, liverworts and hornworts, are what we think are the earliest of land-plant groups. They're the plants that came out of the water and started colonising land and forming oxygen. Mosses form part of the ecosystem. You might not see them, but they're sitting there underneath the soil holding it together in many places. It's only when it rains... they unfurl their leaves, put their little chlorophyll out, turn green and then you’ll spot them everywhere.”
You can contribute to science by uploading photos of your local bryophytes to the iNaturalist website.
Featured Plants:
SPARSE FERN MOSS - Thuidiopsis sparsa
MARBLE SCREW MOSS - Syntrichia papillosa
LEAFY LIVERWORT - Chiloscyphus sp.
Filmed on Kaurna Country | Adelaide, SA
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I loved all the puns, make no mosstake 😊
I love mosses and frequently make terrariums with them. And loved the puns! :D
Very smart, genuine and likable guy!
Agreed!
Love this story. I have a fascination with mosses and photograph them.
Glad you enjoyed it!
Mosses are among my favourite plants. Beautiful.
Brave soul, what dissability? Good on you, you found your calling and your ikigai is looking fantastic. Thank you for what you can attribute to mankind. Thank you for being uniquely you. Be proud of yourselfs. All of you.
Wonderful.. what a lovely person..loved it
We agree!
👍👌
Love moss it is quite magical ….thanks for this podcast..🦠