Earlier posts:
Part 1: Friday 30 Jan - Settle to Carlisle; and first day
Part 2: BLS 2026 Winter Meeting at Carlisle: AGM & Talks
Part 3: BLS 2026 Winter Meeting at Carlisle: Su 1 Feb: This post
Sunday - Cemetery Field Trip
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| 10am Carlisle Cremetorium boundary with Carlisle Cemetery - Fay introduces the morning's instructions in respectful tone.. |
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| Kiar meanwhile glaces at lichens on the adjacent seat |
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| then we all pose for the group photo |
Then we are off to the cemetery proper with grave stones.
What better place to start than a headstone with Psilolechia lucida - well know for liking acid stones and growing in underhangs
On the other side they are looking at Physconia - grisea or enteroxantha. ? John suggests enteroxantha. It is supposed to have bottle-brush rhizines underneath at the centre of the thallus, though it can have simple ones at the edge. Janet cuts of the edge of the thallus to reveal rhizines below. They still don't look very bottle brushy to me - I shall revisit some of my Physconia grisea sites near Settle now and check those..
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| Closer up of Physconia |
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| They are now looking at the Psilolechia side - and the Physconia is in view at the top to us at the centre of the picture. See the tarmac path behind them - we'll be looking at that three pictures below |
| Lecidia lithophila |
John lies down on the tarmac to record common things like Physcia caesia and Lecanora muralis then points to this white lichen - Porpidia crustulata - separated in Dobson from Porpidia macroacarpa by size of apothecia - less than 1.3 mm comes to P crustulata - but he takes a sample home to check.
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| See the white crustose lichen.. |
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| Hope Paul will come back with a suggestion for this. |
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| Back for lunch at 12. |
After lunch I search the group of people I had been with initially, but they have gone. I use the map provided at the Crematorium and set off walking north.. and come to the Dissenters Chapel, The roof facing north had big colonies of Rhizocarpon geographicum and there is Porpidia tuberculosa on the butresses below.
In the bricks and cement on the right I see lots of apothecia
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| I think this is Lecanora albescens - but I really wish I had tested ti with C to make sure it is not L antiqua. Too late now. |
No Rhizocarpon geographicum on the south facing side
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| View west from this chapel |
To the north of this chapel is a low tombstone with a sloping roof, with two interesting lichens - see tomb in foreground:-
On the west facing side there is abundant Cladonia polydactyla.
This is a Cladonia with red apothecia,
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| Cladonia polydactyla |
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| More Cladonia polydactyla - podetia often branched, hornlike and usually proliferating from the rim of a deformed cup. Primary squamules bluish grey with incised tips. On the east facing slope - making flat space between the moss and the foliose lichen are patches of a crustose lichen |
See the patches above, between the moss and the grey foliose lichen
Well this is one lichen I will have to think about.
Still thinking..
Fay gives me a lift back to the station. Here I meet Joseph Halda, also waiting for a train. He buys me a coffee and we sat on the station picnic tables.
I catch the 3:20 train. I enjoy views on the way home. Down there is the meandering river Eden.. The base for the coming BLS spring meeting this 11-18 April. Above is the Pennine ridge - Dufton Pike - and other Hills above High Cup Nick .. Somewhere just beyond there is the site of Moor House a YNU trip to be held there in 1-2 Aug There are patches of snow on the tops. The train travels higher and we near the summit where the rive Swale captures catchment from the River Ure. Weird to see "Dent", "Sheffield" and "Nottingham" - on the train announcement panel. But we pass Garsdale, Dent, Horton in Ribblesdale.. and I get off at Settle.
......just after 5 and get to my car - safely there - but now adorned with 15 huge bird droppings!!. I look up:- Not just tree branches above but also telephone / electric wires. I look down:- the dark tarmac.. not sure if I could see droppings .. but maybe one or two lichens - like those on the crematorium path earlier in the day. I will come back in the daylight on a warm day and check them!!.
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