🌿 MOSS: THE ANCIENT LAND PIONEER
PAGE 1 OF 5, FIRST ONTO LAND
LAND PIONEER
WHEN PLANTS FIRST STEPPED ASHORE
Long before dinosaurs or flowers, tiny plant pioneers crept onto bare rock and mud. Fossil spores from about 470 million years ago mark the earliest known land flora, and scientists link them to moss-like bryophytes. Mosses never grew into towering trees, yet they survived ice ages, droughts, and every major extinction since. Today they carpet forest floors, cling to rooftops, and even thrive in Antarctica after the snow melts.
⚡ DID YOU KNOW?
There are over 12,000 species of moss worldwide. Some patches you walk past may contain dozens of different kinds in a single square metre!
PIONEER!
BRYOPHYTES
🌿 Mosses, liverworts, hornworts
🪨 Non-vascular land plants
🪨 Non-vascular land plants
DEEP TIME
📅 First land spores: ~470 Ma
🌍 Mosses still thrive today
🌍 Mosses still thrive today