Copaon
Plants on top John Farrar Summits: the goal for many, trodden, then left. And so varied, from the roughness of Tryfan to the smooth Moel Eilio. From the crowds of Snowdon to the scarcely visited Dduallt. And when you're on them, what do you see? The view, of course, and perhaps animals: the pair of ravens so often around the cairn of Carnedd Llewelyn, a fox slipping back between rocks, sometimes ,and remarkably, a squirrel crossing a high ridge between valleys. But how often do you see, really see, the plants at your feet?
What they do matters as well as what they are. Vitally, they capture the solar energy that powers the mountain ecosystem. They hold the soil and what nutrients it contains, and support native animal life: insects and mammals above ground, many wriggly things below, the pipits, golden plovers and raptors overhead. They feed sheep for the farmer. They slow the flow of water from rain to river, reducing flooding downstream. And they add a visual joy to our precious mountain landscape.
The plants of our high hills are more than just a list of species.
On grassy summits (Diffwys, Waun Oer), the plants can look rather undistinguished. The ubiquitous mat grass, sheep's fescue, square rush and the odd sedge. The yellow of tormentil is often the only contrast to green, brown and grey. But there is history, deep history, at your feet. There are three species of clubmosses on the summits, first evolved 350 million years ago, when Wales was still south of the equator, and you can bend to touch this ancient form. And just a few centimetres down, the bedrock may be half as old again. On rocky summits (Carnedd Dafydd, Glyder Fawr), both parsley fern and lady fern are in sheltered crevices. Ferns, another link to the ancient, first evolved at about the same time as clubmosses. But on the high rocks, mosses and lichens dominate: Racomitrium's grey-green clumps between rocks, near-black Andreaea on them, and the ubiquitous yellow map lichen. There are many other rock-living lichens and mosses, and they are very hard to identify. Even here, there is a dearth of our rarer and more spectacular flowers, for it is on the more basic rocks in the high cymoedd (cirques in English) that most arctic-alpines are found. Some slightly lower summits are heathercovered and give tough walking; try the Rhinogydd. Heathland, with a good mix of bilberry, cross-leaved heath (where it's wet, along with Sphagnum moss) and bell heather (where dry), is a habitat of European importance.
Cennau • Lichens Š John Farrar
6 | Gwarchod a dathlu Eryri ers 50 mlynedd: 1967 - 2017
Perhaps the most striking summit vegetation, found on the tops of the western Carneddau and the northern Glyderau, is that based on dwarf willow. Wales' smallest tree, only a few centimetres high, is a plant of the high tops. You can walk over swards of it without noticing it, but on it a whole ecosystem depends. The leaves often have sawfly galls, but it is the roots that are really significant, for they have a symbiotic relationship with a considerable range of fungi. Most dramatic,