A moss is a simple rootless plant with leaflike growths in a spiral around a stalk. Moss plants are held in place by rootlike filaments or threads made up only a few long cells called rhizoids. One type of liverwort is a simple, rootless plant that has a flattened, leaflike body. Liverworts get their name because, to some people, they look like a liver. The ending, -wort, means ?herb,? so the word liverwort means ?herb for the liver.? In liverworts rhizoid is made up of just one cell. Both mosses and liverworts grow in damp areas and range in size from 2 to 5 centimeters in height.

Of approximately 20 000 species of nonvascular plants, most are classified as mosses. H

Spike mosses look similar to club mosses. One species of spike moss, the resurrection plant, is adapted to desert conditions. When water isn?t available, the plant curls up and looks dead. But when water falls in the desert, the resurrection plant unfurls its green leaves and begins making food again. The plant can go through this process many times if necessary.

When a volcano erupts, the lava covers the land and destroys the plants living there. After the lava cools, the spores of mosses and liverworts are carried to the new rocks by the wind and begin to grow wherever there is enough water. When they grow on rocks, their rhizoids can actually begin to penetrate tiny cracks in the rocks? surfaces. Weathering of rocks often begins when mosses release chemicals that begin to break down rocks. Organisms that are the first to grow in new or disturbed areas like these are called pioneer species. Pioneer plant species grow and die and begin to build up decaying plant material that provides nutrients for other less hardy plants. That is, these pioneer plants change the conditions in the environment so that other plants can grow there, too. Eventually, larger vascular plants can begin to grow, sending their roots down through the decaying plants and into the rocks underneath. As the roots grow, they crack the rocks apart even more, and the weathering process slowly turns the rocks into new soil.

A second and larger group of simple plant include the seedless vascular plants. These plants differ from mosses mainly because they have vascular tissue. They differ from other vascular plants because they produce spores rather than seeds. The vascular tissue in the seedless vascular plants is made up of long, tubelike cells. These cells carry water, minerals, and nutrients to all the cells throughout the plant. Why is having cells like these an advantage to a plant? Remember that bryophytes are only a few cells thick. Each cell absorbs water directly from its environment. As a result, these plants do not grow very big. Plants with vascular tissue, on the other hand, can grow bigger and thicker because each cell gets water and nutrients through the vascular tissue.

Some topics in this essay:
Life Cycle, Horsetails Horsetails, Liverworts Mosses, Nonvascular Plants, Mosses Club, Vascular Plants, Formation Fuel, Plants Seedless, Alternate Generations, Asexual Reproduction, vascular plants, club mosses, mosses liverworts, seedless vascular plants, life cycle, seedless vascular, vascular tissue, nonvascular plants, moss plants, sex cells, plants grow, mosses spike mosses, club mosses spike, simple rootless plant, plants bryophytes ferns,