B. Papp szerk.: Studia Botanica Hungarica 34. 2003 (Budapest, 2003)

Szurdoki, Erzsébet: Peat mosses of North Hungary

that, it still lives in Salix dominated areas. S. centrale populations of North Hungary are the most important ones in whole Hungary. Sphagnum magellanicum Brid. It is a robust plant and from anthocyan, in light is red coloured. It is easily recognisable in the field based on its colour and size, but the shade forms, which are green, can be undoubtedly determined only by microscopic examination. The cross sections of spreading branch leaves are typical, the small and oval-shaped green cells are enclosed into the large hyaline cells (DANIELS and EDDY 1985). It is rare in all parts of Hungary, with most of the occurrences in North Hungary; in West Hungary it is extremely rare (ODOR et al. 2002). It still lives in Nyírjes-tó, Kis-Mohos, Nyíres-tó and there is a new occurrence from the Zemplén Mts. It has disappeared from two mires of the Bereg Plain (Table 1). From Mohos lakes, only Kis-Mohos has recent records of this species. It lives in the central part of the mire in the following associations: Betulo pubescentis-Sphagnetum, Eriophoro vaginati-Sphagnetum and Sphagno flexuosi-Eriophoretum angustifolii (LÁJER 1998«, SZURDOKI et al. in press). Earlier it was also published from the central part of Nagy-Mohos (ZÓLYOMI 1931, BOROS 1964, and CZENTHE 1985). The new and old distribution data show that S. magellanicum prefers the central, open and most nutrient poor sites. In the Bereg Plain, a small population of S. magellanicum still lives in Nyíres-tó. It forms small patches on the side of small hummocks in Eriophoro vaginati-Sphagnetum. Its amount has increased in the past few years (LÁJER 1998a, SZURDOKI and NAGY 2002). Earlier it had much higher abundance (SIMON 1960, FINTHA 1994, LÁJER 1998a) but in the mid-1990s, when this bog became much drier, S. magellanicum has almost disappeared. It lived in Navat (SIMON 1960), but after the fire in 1967 it has disappeared (FINTHA 1994). FINTHA (1994) also published S. magellanicum from Bence-tó as being abundant, but neither earlier nor later this species was found there. S. magellanicum lived in Nyírjes-tó in the past decades (MÁTHÉ and KOVÁCS 1958, BOROS 1964). It was collected from the central, open part (MÁTHÉ and KOVÁCS 1958). In the 1990s the author found only a few amount of S. magellanicum on the top of a small hummock in Carici lasioearpae-Sphagnetum community. A new, interesting occurrence of the species was discovered in the Zemplén Mts in the valley of Suta-patak, where it lives on wet soil (SZURDOKI et al. 2000).