Cryptogams: Spores & More

If you started with no prior knowledge, here are the ten most important facts you have learned:

1. The Meaning of "Hidden Marriage"

You now know that Cryptogam comes from the Greek kryptos (hidden) and gamos (marriage). This refers to the fact that they do not have visible flowers or seeds; their "marriage" or reproductive process happens out of sight, often at a microscopic level.

2. Spores vs. Seeds

You have learned that while most garden plants use seeds (which contain an embryo and a food supply), cryptogams primarily use spores. These are usually single-celled and incredibly hardy, allowing life to spread across vast distances via wind or water.

3. They Are "Biological Pioneers"

You understand that cryptogams like mosses and lichens are often the "first responders" in an ecosystem. They can grow on bare rock, breaking it down into soil so that "higher" plants like trees and flowers can eventually take root.

4. Ferns: The Ancient Vascular Giants

You’ve discovered that Ferns (Pteridophytes) were among the first plants to develop a vascular system (veins to move water). This allowed their ancestors to grow as tall as trees over 300 million years ago, long before the age of dinosaurs.

5. Horsetails are "Living Fossils"

You now recognise Horsetails as one of the oldest living lineages of plants. They still look much like they did in the Carboniferous period, and their stems are reinforced with silica, making them so abrasive they were historically used as "scouring rushes" to clean pots.

6. Mosses are "Non-Vascular" Survivors

You know that Mosses and Liverworts (Bryophytes) lack the internal "plumbing" of larger plants. Because they can't pump water upward, they stay small and low to the ground, but they have the incredible ability to survive complete dehydration and "spring back" to life when it rains.

7. Fungi Are Not Plants

This is a major biological distinction: Fungi belong to their own kingdom. They don’t photosynthesise (make food from light); instead, they release enzymes to decompose organic matter. The mushroom you see is just the "fruit," while the real organism is a massive underground web called mycelium.

8. Lichens are a "Two-in-One" Organism

You’ve learned that a Lichen isn't a single plant, but a partnership (symbiosis) between a fungus and an algae (or cyanobacteria). The fungus provides the home and protection, while the algae provides the food through photosynthesis.

9. Slime Moulds: Intelligence Without a Brain

Perhaps the most surprising fact is that Slime Moulds (protists) can solve mazes and find the most efficient routes to food despite having no brain or nervous system. They move as one giant "super-cell" called a plasmodium.

10. They are "Environmental Canaries"

Finally, you understand that because cryptogams absorb water and nutrients directly from the air and rain, they are highly sensitive to pollution. Their health—especially that of lichens and mosses—serves as a vital early-warning system for the health of our planet's air and water.