Andreaea regularis Mull. Hal.

Andreaea regularis Müll.Hal.

SPECIMENS EXAMINED. — Antarctica. West Antarctic Peninsula, Graham Coast, Wilhelm Archipelago, in the north-eastern part of Hovgaard Island, 65°07’14”S, 64°04’05”W, alt. 30 m a.s.l., on rocky cliffs, 20.II.2019, Parnikoza & Ivanets 12/19 (KRAM [B-258904]); same area, alt. 30 m a.s.l., on exposed rock surface above the moss bank and below the stand of Hymenoloma crispulum (Hedw.) Ochyra associated with Kiaeria pumila (Mitt.) Ochyra and Bucklandiella sudetica (Funck) Bedn. -Ochyra & Ochyra, 12.II.2022, Parnikoza 01/22 (KRAM [B-262847]); same area, 65°07’15”S, 64°04’07”W, alt. 30 m a.s.l., in the lower part of the exposed rocky buttress in the company of bryophyte species growing in the immediate vicinity, including Sanionia georgicouncinata (Müll.Hal.) Ochyra & Hedenäs, Polytrichastrum alpinum, Kiaeria pumila, Pohlia nutans (Hedw.) Lindb. and Barbilophozia hatcheri (A.Evans) Loeske, 12.II.2022, Parnikoza 10/22 (KRAM [B-262841]).

Hovgaard Island is the second largest island in the Wilhelm Archipelago situated between Booth Island and Petermann Island off the Graham Coast. Bryologically, the island is very poorly known and the only moss collection consisting of a few specimens was made on it in February 1905 by J. Turquet, a naturalist to the third French Antarctic Expedition of 1903- 1905. Cardot (1906, 1907) recognised four species, which according to modern taxonomic concepts represented three species: Polytrichastrum alpinum, Pohlia cruda (Hedw.) Lindb. and Bryum pseudotriquetrum (Hedw.) P.Gaertn., B.Mey. & Scherb. (Ochyra et al. 2008a). A recent survey of the island’s bryoflora yielded some additional moss and hepatic species, including Andreaea regularis. Occurrence of this species on Hovgaard Island was expected since it is frequently collected on the coterminous islands in the Wilhelm Archipelago, although, surprisingly, it is very rare on the mainland Graham Coast where it has so far only been recorded on Cape Tuxen (Fig. 1).

Andreaea regularis is the most widespread and abundant species of the genus Andreaea Hedw. in the Antarctic, extending from Leskov Island in the South Sandwich Islands and the orphaned BouvetØya in the South Atlantic Ocean in the north to George VI South and Charcot Island off Alexander Island in the south, although becoming scattered and localised south of the Antarctic Circle (Ochyra et al. 2008a). It is especially abundant on the peri-Antarctic archipelagoes of the South Orkney Islands and the South Shetland Islands, on the Danco Coast, and on the northern part of the Graham Coast on the west side of the Antarctic Peninsula. On the east side of the Antarctic Peninsula it is very rare on Joinville Island and James Ross Island and on the Oscar II Coast and Wilkinson Coast. As the only species of its genus, A. regularis has been found in East Antarctica at several sites on the Eights Coast on Ellsworth Land. Andreaea regularis is an amphiatlantic subantarctic species which is widely scattered at montane elevations in the western fringes of southern South America from Tierra del Fuego to the Province of Valdivia, in the Falkland Islands and on subantarctic South Georgia, the Prince Edward Islands and Îles Crozet extending northwards to Tristan da Cunha and Bolivia in the Central Andes (Zanten 1971; Ochyra & Hertel 1990; Ochyra et al. 2008a).