Hair Dye | Rare Lichen Found For First Time In Wales In Gregynog Hall's Grounds

Saturday, February 4th, 2012

The ornate splendour of its manor house and lavish gardens provided a home for generations of Welsh gentry.

But now a new inhabitant has been found among the historic grounds of the stunning Gregynog Hall, near Caersws, in Powys – an extremely rare lichen never seen before in Wales.

It is thought the endangered Enterographa sorediata lichen may have flourished at Gregynog – once owned by the famous art-collecting Davies sisters – because of the Victorian fashion for the type of trees on which the species thrive.

At the time at which Gregynong’s gardens were laid out, horticultural fashion dictated most designed to include large areas of natural-looking parkland.

As a result, its grounds are now home to a number of gnarled old trees that provide a perfect habitat for the new discovery.

Its dull grey appearance may look unedifying to the untrained eye, but conservationists say the discovery could be of international importance.

Experts from environmental charity Plantlife, who found the specimen, say it confirms Wales’ status as one of the most important places in the world for the study of lichen, with our air quality seen as a crucial factor in its growth here.

Lichens are a successful alliance between a fungus and an alga – each doing what it does best, and thriving as a result of a natural co-operation.

They live as one organism, both inhabiting the same “body”.

They are not parasites but simply set up home and use sunlight to make sugars or food which will feed both the fungus and the alga.

The lichen found at the Great Wood has the scientific name of Enterographa sorediata – literally translated as the “floury-granuled internal-writing lichen”.

On its surface there are patches of flour-like granules, whilst if you scratch the grey bits the black,

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