Faerieland!

Here's a mossy landscape that just beckons you to take a long, leisurely and contemplative walk among the really little faerie people ... that's what this photo evokes for us. Fernymoss has for quite some time aspired to plant Faerie friendly areas in various spots in the garden and this stepping stone is one of them. (Yes, he's into making those as well!) We do try to encourage moss to take hold around the garden, just because we find it fascinating and really pretty and it lends a certain aged gravitas to wherever it prospers in the garden. For us, it connotes a sense of garden maturity ... that things have been around long enough that the moss has taken hold and incorporated itself into the landscape. And as the old saying goes, a rolling stone gathers no moss, it tends to convey a somewhat comforting aura of permanence ... it's taken a while to get where it is, and it's planning on sticking around for the long haul.

Mosses are bryophytes or non-vascular plants, and have a rather fascinating sex life of their own, as this entry in Wikipedia details quite well. Obviously I have some more homework to do and research to read before I can even begin to consider myself competently conversant in the ways of the mosses. Though an often overlooked (perhaps even considered bothersome) element of gardens, we're fully on board with having them in ours ... They make stellar companions to the various ferns which also tend to inhabit the same spaces as the mosses. We like 'em and want them to multiply freely!

Photo by Fernymoss, taken on 21 April, 2008 using the S700. Note the clearly visible sporophytes on the right side of this photo.