- Mosses are small, non-vascular flowerless plants in the taxonomic division Bryophyta (/braɪˈɒfətə/, /ˌbraɪ.əˈfaɪtə/) sensu stricto. Bryophyta (sensu lato, Schimp. 1879) may also refer to the parent group bryophytes, which comprise liverworts, mosses, and hornworts. Mosses typically form dense green clumps or mats, often in damp or shady locations. The individual plants are usually composed of simple leaves that are generally only one cell thick, attached to a stem that may be branched or unbranched and has only a limited role in conducting water and nutrients. Although some species have conducting tissues, these are generally poorly developed and structurally different from similar tissue found in vascular plants. Mosses do not have seeds and after fertilisation develop sporophytes with unbranched stalks topped with single capsules containing spores. They are typically 0.2–10 cm (0.1–3.9 in) tall, though some species are much larger. Dawsonia, the tallest moss in the world, can grow to 50 cm (20 in) in height. There are approximately 12,000 species.
- Star Tales - Corona Australis (ianridpath.com)
Corona Australis was known to the Greeks not as a crown but as a wreath, which is how it is depicted on old star maps. Aratus did not name it as a separate constellation but referred to it simply as a circlet of stars beneath the forefeet of Sagittarius. Hyginus said it was a wreath cast off by the archer ‘as by one at play’.