Moss wound dressing, and menstrual fluid absorption. Tribes of the Pacific Northwest in the United States and Canada used mosses to clean salmon prior to drying, and packed wet moss into pit ovens for steaming camas bulbs. Food storage baskets and boiling baskets were also packed with mosses. There is a substantial market in mosses gathered from the wild. The uses for intact moss are principally in the florist trade and for home decoration. Decaying moss in the genus "Sphagnum" is also the major component of peat, which is "mined" for use as a fuel, as a horticultural soil additive, and
Sphagnum all other land plants, has an alternation of generations; like other bryophytes, the haploid gametophyte generation is dominant and persistent. Unlike other mosses, the long-lived gametophytes do not rely upon rhizoids to assist in water uptake. "Sphagnum" species can be unisexual (male or female, dioecious) or bisexual (male and female gametes produced from the same plant; monoecious); In North America, 80% of "Sphagnum" species are unisexual. Gametophytes have substantial asexual reproduction by fragmentation, producing much of the living material in sphagnum peatlands. Swimming sperm fertilize eggs contained in archegonia that remain attached to the female gametophyte. The sporophyte is relatively