Bramble Workshop and other botanical delights

One of the tricky Brambles
Image: G. Quartly-Bishop

Looking through the various Blogs by BSBI members - there are 38 of them now! - is a great way to find out which plants BSBI members have been looking at this summer. 

There is an excellent post here from Gail Quartly-Bishop about BSBI's recent Bramble ID Workshop. Gail agrees that "brambles are pretty tricky" but is now feeling more confident about telling them apart and will be looking out for interesting Rubus sspp. on her local patch.

Welsh Officer Paul Green has been surveying Impatiens noli-tangere sites in in north Wales, S. J. Thomas looked for x Agropogon robinsonii in Aberystwyth, the Breconshire Group found the invasive alien Crassula helmsii and in Llanelli, Gower Wildlife found that Cabbage Palms seem to be "jumping the garden fence". 

Paul Green was also out plant-hunting in Co. Wexford and his specimen of Epilobium x confusilobium has been confirmed by BSBI's Willow-herb Referee. 

Trifolium micranthum was recorded for the first time in Dunbartonshire, and Stephen Bungard and Carl Farmer refound Alchemilla wichurae, Arabidopsis petraea and Euphrasia ostenfeldii on Skye. They also found new sites for Juncus biglumis near the summit of the Storr. 

Trifolium micranthum
courtesy of http://www.floralimages.co.uk/default.php

You already know about the Oxfordshire Flora Group (including new member Oli Pescott) whose recent findings are reported here. 

And Ambroise Baker is back from fieldwork in northern Ireland (looking at aquatics) and has posted about his finds here. His Blog also includes this report on conserving an endangered population of Festuca altissima, rediscovered in Sheffield. 

Ambroise and Oli are also mentioned in this post by the South Yorkshire Botany Group - they all had a great day out and found plants such as Hirschfeldia incana and Catapodium rigidum on the site of an old nursery. 

So, keep an eye on our members' Blogs (list on right) to find out which plants BSBI botanists are recording across Britain and Ireland. And let us know what you are spotting too!