Came across this growing by the side of a path on our way to the Half Moon in Plumpton. It also caught the eye of our friend who was visiting who runs Alexandra Nursery in Penge (think Petersham on a smaller community scale). I've not seen it before but recognised it from Mr Rose's book. My subconscious botanist suggested laurel-spurge but on checking I find it's actually Spurge-Laurel, Daphne laureola. It looks like a garden escape or an introduced species but in fact it's native in England and Wales. The only other Spurge-laurel in the UK is Mezereon which seems to be even rarer.
Another moss, this time collected on our Boxing Day walk across the Downs from Firle Beacon and back along the old coach road for a warming pint of Harveys in the Ram's snug. It is Neat Feather-moss, Pseudoscleropodium purum, and this is a terrible photo of one of the branches of it taken through the stereomicroscope. Through the hand lens it appears to have succulent overlapping leaves that completely obscure the stem, each with a small recurved mucronate point.
It is common throughout the British Isles.
Another plant I can't believe didn't get blogged before. The campions, Silene, are a familiar genus. Red Campion is probably best known, but White Campion, Silene latifolia, is also widespread. It can be confused with Bladder Campion and, by the sea, Sea Campion, which both have white flowers. White Campion is usually very hairy. It is also dioecious - having separate male and female plants.
This is a common snail which can have be found with a wider variety of patterns. Cepaea nemoralis is known as a Grove snail or Brown-lipped snail and is a terrestrial, pulmonate, gastropod mollusc. Nice.
Here's another common plant: the Common Spotted-Orchid, Dactylorhiza fuchsii. It has transversely elongated spots on its leaves (hence the name) which help distinguish it from Early Purple-Orchid, which has longitudinally elongated spots, and Heath Spotted-Orchid, which has circular spots. These plants were found on the same day, not far from each other, illustrating the range of colours and patterns found within this species.
This day-flying moth was spotted enjoying the nectar from Horseshoe vetch up on the Downs. It's Burnet Companion, Euclidia glyphica, and is reasonably common down south, especially on chalk grassland.
Giant Bellflower is not common down south. This is the white form, Campanula latifolia var alba, which is often grown in gardens. Indeed this is likely to have escaped from a garden. It was found back in early July on the Downs near Lewes.
I took this back in April. It's a garden escape because it isn't native here, originating from the western United States and Canada. It is Flowering Currant, Ribes sanguineum, and its attractive flowers and early flowering make it something of a horticultural favourite. It was introduced to this country in 1826 with the first record of a naturalised plant in 1916. Since that time it has spread and can be found from the Highlands to the south coast.
Busy entertaining Beasley yesterday so didn't get to post (again). He'd come from Australia so it seemed reasonable to put the blog on hold (again).
This is another find in the annals: Common Bird's-foot-trefoil, Lotus corniculatus, also known as Bacon-and-Eggs. (cf. Common Toadflax).
There is also Narrow-leaved BFT and Greater BFT, but this is Common and also common. It is an important food plant for many butterflies, particularly the Blues.
Not quite the mouthwatering herb we're familiar with in our pesto and shredded over tomato and mozzarella salad. This was just about flowering on a downland walk in October. Wild Basil, Clinopodium vulgare.
I thought we might be overdue diptera so here are a pair of mating Yellow Dung Flies, Scathophaga stercoraria, at it hammer and tongs up on the Downs. The male is on top with the fancy golden hairy pantaloons. They are one of the commonest flies in the world, their distribution reflecting that of human animal husbandry.
They are also one of the most studied organisms in the world, lending themselves, like their prey and smaller cousins the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster, to scientific experiment as a result of their rapid reproductive turnover.
The female lays her eggs on fresh dung and the larvae grow through three stages over five days. They then spend a further five days emptying their stomachs before burying down beneath the dung to pupate.
The young flies are anautogenous, which means they can't crack on with the sex until they've fed up for it.
No shit!
Another annual ruderal species which is common round us in Sussex. It is appropriate to find it on the Downs, whose landscape and habitats are a direct result of sheep grazing over millennia, for it is known as Shepherd's purse, Capsella bursa-pastoris. It is a member of the mustard family, Brassiaceae and not a native but an archeophyte.
An archeophyte is a naturalised plant introduced before 1492 (yes, Columbus and all that) whereas after that date such plants are known as neophytes.
The reason for its common name (a direct translation of the Latin specific) is the shape of the seed pods apparently resembling the purse carried by shepherds. Which shepherds and when is hard to discover.
So this is today's post (as opposed to the previous post, which was in fact 'yesterday's' post). It's another plant I'm surprised I haven't done before as it is, like Selfheal, common, especially round these chalky parts.
It is Agrimony, Agrimonia eupatoria, a member of the Rose family.
You can tell it's not Fragrant Agrimony because it's not 'up north' and also the receptacle cup's hooked bristles are all pointing forwards or at most horizontal, as opposed to reflexed.
And there was I thinking I'd posted something yesterday. Wrong! I think I got distracted after I put my back out in the process of unblocking one of our most important drains: the one that takes the waste water from the washing machine. (We had developed a grey-water spring that appeared in the flowerbed outside the back door every time we used the washing machine over the last week.) A judicious cocktail of drugs and the diversion of Keef's 50th birthday bash conspired to make me forget the blog.
Anyhow, a short but scenic autumnal stroll with Abbey and Molly along the Downs to Itford Hill from Beddingham Hill threw up a number of interesting species.This, Selfheal or Prunella vulgaris, I thought I'd already posted, but apparently not. So here it is.
It's a member of the Dead-nettle family, Lamiaceae.
This is noticeable at the moment: Dogwood, Cornus sanguinea. It is one of the first to but on a good display of autumnal colour and currently the A27 is lined by burgundy-leaved specimens some of which are flowering a second time. It has an unusual characteristic in that you can carefully pull the leaf into two parts and it will remain connected by the phloem which consists of spiral cell assemblages (see bottom right photo).
There is a fascinating etymology for Dogwood: one theory is that the name derives from the Old English dagwood. Dags (arrows, daggers, sharp pointy things) were made from its hard slender stems. The The Canterbury Tales it is referred to as 'whipple-tree' after its use in carts for a section that connects the cart to the horse.
Here it is at last, one of the greatest organisms in the land: English Oak, Pedunculate Oak; Quercus robur. (Curiously it is also known as French Oak!) The term pedunculate comes from the fact that the acorns are borne on stalks, unlike the other native oak, Q. petraea, on which they grow attached directly to the twig (giving rise to its common name of Sessile Oak.)
There are lots of species in the genus Quercus, but this is the type species. It is one of our longest lived plants. The UK has an unusually high number of ancient oaks compared with other European countries. One of the highlights of my natural history peregrinations was being shown around the ancient oaks of Staverton Park by the late, great Prof Oliver Rackham.
An ancient oak can support more insects than any other plant, with more than 400 recorded.
Our oaks are in a bit of trouble from diseases such as Phytophthera and Acute Oak Decline. Prof Rackham was also of the opinion that oaks had stopped self-seeding successfully in woodlands, although whether this was due to deer or disease he wasn't sure.
The oldest trees have all been pollarded. Some are more than a 1000 years old. Old trees often look to be dying but in fact remain alive for hundreds or years. In such states they are at their ecological peak.
The first time I saw this flower I thought it must be an orchid, it looked so exotic! It is a lovely flower: Common Toadflax, Linaria vulgaris, is actually one of the ruderal species we generally would ignore were it not for its stunning inflorescence. It is out now in a ruderal location near you!
Common names for it include Butter-and-eggs; not to be confused with Bacon-and-eggs which is Birdsfoot Trefoil.
This is still flowering: Common Knapweed or Centaurea nigra. It was growing around the base of an arable field hedge on the Downs behind our house.
Another name for it is Hardheads, on account of its compact involucre.
Here's a scabious. Here's another scabious. What sort of scabious is this?
It's a Devil's-bit Scabious, Succisa pratensis, of course! This is a particularly hairy one, but you can see the differences between this and yesterday's Small Scabious. (So I won't enumerate them.) It was growing a couple of metres away from yesterday's plant.
It's called Devil's bit because of the abrupt ending of the root, bitten off by the Devil for differing reasons depending on who you believe. In all stories the Devil was pissed off with the plant and trying to reduce it's vitality/ability to cure.
The Scabiouses are so-called because of the belief in their ability to cure scabies and other ailments affecting the skin.
This is Small Scabious, Scabiosa columbaria. Key features are its markedly larger outer florets; the black bristle-like calyx teeth and the pinnatifid leaves (although these can be variable).
It is a plant of calcareous grasslands and more common in the south-east.
