Spotting flowers growing wild in South East UK
Spotting wildflowers on our weekends away In September and October Mike and I went on various trips in Ethel the campervan and were lucky with the weather! Early Sept – by the Great Ouse river in St Neots Cambridgeshire We took the van to a peaceful riverside location and went for walks along the banks….
Wildflowers on a nature walk A week after counting Moon Carrots on Seaford Head I was back up there with Seaford Natural History Society on a nature walk lead by Sussex Wildlife Trust. As for the last few posts, I have marked any chalk grassland indicator species with an L. I didn’t photograph last weeks…
Wildflowers of Short Cliff and inland Short Cliff is the next cliff along from Hope Gap travelling East. If you head inland towards South Hill Barn you cross a large area of short grass which is managed by Sussex Wildlife trust using grazing. This area is bounded to the West by an area of scrub…
Wildflowers of Hope Gap After counting Moon Carrots on Seaford Head Nature Reserve in Sussex, I kept my phone at the ready for photography and walked home slowly. This post is in two parts because I took so many photos! This part will be about Hope Bottom and the area around Hope Gap where we…
Seseli libanotis is a rare UK wildflower Seaford Natural History Society counts wild plants of Moon Carrot every year to monitor numbers. Being a clifftop plant, coastal erosion means that the whole colony is in danger of failure in a single rock fall. Moon carrot grows on our chalk cliffs The plant is found right near…
A weekend in Sussex woodland At the end of July Mike and I took Ethel the camper van to the other side of Sussex to visit friends. It was very wet underfoot but we managed not to get rained on! Flora of Guestling Wood Blue Star Creeper – Pratia pedunculata I have never seen this…
Thistle plants and more Hairy Mallow This was my last day with Chris and Colin counting wildflowers on National Trust land above the Seven Sisters cliffs in the South Downs National Park in Sussex. Counting wildflowers on the South Downs We found many flowers from the species list mentioned in Part 1 but they’re not…
Holiday by the river Ouse Back to nature in a shepherd’s hut We always take our adult kids away during the summer holidays but this year was slightly different due to covid. Not wanting to commit to a large or foreign holiday, we booked a few nights just up the road from us in Ringmer….
More chalk grassland indicator species We returned to Gayles Farm the following week to survey another field or two. I should say that the survey methods and recording were all carefully adhered to, and were ably undertaken by Chris and Colin, I was just along to speed up the spotting! The main photo above shows…
Chalk grassland indicator species in South Downs National Park Three days after visiting Crowlink, a smaller group of us found ourselves nearby at Gayles Farm. This time it was just myself, Chris (experienced amateur botanist) and Colin who was recording. It was a lovely sunny morning and the views were fab. The main image is…