Mosses, lycophytes, and monilophytes

For the past five or more years the term has started on a Thursday, which meant that the first ethnobotany class was also on the first day of class at the end of the week. Attendance had suffered as a result. This was the second term that class started on a Monday, which put the first ethnobotany class on the second day of classes on a full week of class.

On the first day I told the students that on Thursday they ought not bring books nor backpacks, and if they had such, they could leave them in the division storage closet.

On the second day of class, the class headed out on the hike into the valley of the monilophytes. I did not open the classroom, opting to leave from in front of the classroom at 3:30 to maximize the time available for the hike.

We stopped to put backpacks in the division supply closet. Behind the gym the class paused briefly as I looked for moss sporophytes. I did not see any and moved on.

This term I did not head down into the valley with the Psilotum nudum as a recent visit suggested there was none to be easily found.

The class stopped on the ridgeline to view the lycopodium Lycopodiella cernua and the sun-loving fern Dicranopteris linearis. Lycopodium is a member of the division Lycophyta, the ferns are members of Monilophyta. After a fire four years ago, and over-harvesting due to decoration for graduation, the Lycopodiella had become scarce.

Renee Iva, Keylafay, and Thomas

Last term the Lycopodiella appeared to be recovering, and this spring term 2012 the recovery appears to have continued.

Yet again the language loss among the students was severe. Last term one student came up with kidien mal, this term none.

The class then paused at the top of the steep slope where Nephrolepis acutifolia.and Cyclosorus maemonensis were observed. A tree at the top of the trail now has a healthy growth of the lycopodium Huperzia phlegmaria on the trunk. Since last January strobili have developed on this plant. Only one  student could name the Nephrolepis fern - rehdil.  Local uses and meanings of these plants was also explained, along with names in the local languages. The local names for Microsorum scolopendria, its use as a mwarmwar, and the function the plant had as a mwarmwar in protecting the dancer from soumwahuen eni were covered. A plant known locally as marekenleng was located on a tree, this plant is currently listed in the virtual herbarium as Asplenium polyodon.

Also found atop the steep slope was Davallia solida (ulung en kieil). I was so taken aback by broad and deep loss of language, that I forgot to cover the term devolution. Asplenium nidus was encountered as we descended the slope. Now that I no longer cover the use of Haploteris elongata, the fern is re-establishing on the trees at the top of the slope. This omission has been necessary due to over harvesting of the plants. This term again I mentioned only the Pohnpeian name and that the fern is a primitive fern.

Down in the forest I could not locate Davallia pectinata. This term I also did not locate the Psilotum complanatumPsilotum complanatum has appeared, however, in the ethnobotanical garden. The Asplenium Polyodon was still present both on top of the slope and in the valley.

Father along the trail the class observed Sphaeropteris nigricans.

I then took the class down to the river and up to the Antrophyum callifolium. We reached theA. callifolium around 16:30. No one said that they knew its name, no one indicated that they had seen this fern before. I then took role and dismissed the class.

Overall my impression continued to be that plant language loss is increasing term-on-term. While there will always be statistical fluctuations in the knowledge set of a given class, monilophyte and lycophyte local plant name loss is now simply pervasive among youth here.
Keylafay

On Thursday the 12th of January the students cleaned up the ethnobotanical garden.

Rico

Renee Iva present the life cycle of mosses

Moss sporophytes have been consistently seen on a Premna serratifolia on the east end of the campus.


Cindy covers the morphology of lycopodium

Rosalina, Gifteen, and Serpina cover local names and their proper pronounciation


Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Plotting polar coordinates in Desmos and a vector addition demonstrator

Setting up a boxplot chart in Google Sheets with multiple boxplots on a single chart

Traditional food dishes of Micronesia