How might a mat of mosses protect a forest?

Mosses play important roles in filtering and storing the water and nutrients that forests need to survive and grow. Mosses are important because they help regulate water in the forest ecosystem by slowly absorbing and releasing rainfall while keeping nutrients in place. Their nutrients and water come from rainfall or running water.

the nitrogen cycle provides nitrogen to the ecosystem from the atmosphere, ground and oceans. nitrogen is an important component of complex molecules such as amino acids and nucleotides, which lead to the creation of proteins and dna, the building blocks of all life. plants absorb nitrogen in the form of ammonium, nitrate ion and, on rare occasions, as amino acids. animals receive nitrogen necessary for biological processes from feeding on living or dead organic matter.