Botanical Finds in Cornwall - End of July 2022

 This blog wraps up my finds for July and it encompasses several venues. My first photo below is not of a plant but of an Adder. This is the UK's only venomous snake and they are as common on moors and heaths in Cornwall, as they were on chalk grasslands in Kent. Having said that, they are in decline overall due to habitat loss.

I've posted this photo first as a warning. I very nearly trod on this sunbathing Adder near Tregoss Moor. I am very pleased I saw it before my foot went down and I could back off without getting bitten. Had I trod on it, I surely would have needed the Cornwall air ambulance to get me to hospital many miles away in Truro.

It quickly slithered off once it realised I had backed off and they can move very fast too. Watch where you tread when in the countryside, especially if you are off the beaten track as I often am. Fortunately, my eyes are usually looking at the ground ahead of me for plants, but others don't look down anywhere near as often, take care!

Vipera berus

Oblong-leaved Sundews are still a novelty for me as I'd never seen any that weren't round before moving to Cornwall. They seem to be a bit smaller and more compact than their Round-leaved cousins and perhaps redder in colour too. However, one can't dispute their oblong-ness. There's the remains of a fly on this one, yes, these plants eat meat!

Drosera intermedia

Found at Retire Common on the eastern arm of that reserve. This was very dry and although I wore wellies, I hardly sunk in mire anywhere apart from the central area of the bog.

The Common Hemp-Nettle below seems to be an unusual find as this one is the only one I've seen here this Summer. A single plant amongst Heather, Gorse and Bell Heather near Tregoss Moor. Its similar looking relative, the Bifid Hemp-Nettle has a notch in the centre lower petal and is usually pinker too.

Galeopsis tetrahit

Wavy-leaved St. John's wort is a new one for me. I wondered how difficult it would be to identify it given the flowers of these species tend to look very similar.

I needn't have worried, they are so striking you can't miss them or mistake them for other Hypericums.

Look at those stunning crimson stripes under the petals!

The photo below shows most of the plant which shows the sepals are also bright red before they open. Superficially like Slender St. John's wort but the plant is much larger with bigger flowers too. Another Retire Common beauty.

Hypericum undulatum

I almost forgot to show a wavy edged leaf from whence they get their name!

My visit to Retire Common also threw up a new species for me with this White-beaked Sedge. It was present in large numbers on the eastern arm of the reserve.

Rhynchospora alba

I've never seen such a perfectly formed Beefsteak Fungus before, velvety to the touch and looking like a beef steak of course. Found on a tree near the town of Rock.

Fistulina hepatica

Sea Beet is a common plant along our coasts and is generally a rather boring plant with spikes of green petal-less flowers. However, once these go to seed, they look spectacular when you look close up. They are very colourful and look like little triffids that just might open up and take a bite out of you as you pass by.

Beta vulgaris ssp maritima

Houndstongue is uncommon in Cornwall and elsewhere. Flowering has long gone, but the seeds are just as interesting. The little spines hook onto the fur of passing animals and help disperse it. I found a single seeding plant along the high tide line of the Camel Estuary near Porthilly.

Cynoglossum officinale

Likewise with the Burnet Rose below, except the seeds are contained within a hip of course.  The hips are distinctive and help to identify it from other roses, but if you look at the top right of the photo you might notice the stem. This is densely packed with small bristles amongst the thorns and is a good ID feature too. Fairly common along the north Cornwall coast and on Cornish walls here.

Rosa spinosissima

I featured Jersey Cudweed not too long ago having found it next to a superstore in Bodmin. I found some more when taking an evening walk around Wadebridge. Behind the Premier Inn was a bit of brownfield concrete long abandoned, so I took a look hoping for some Cudweeds that like the dry conditions found there. I wasn't disappointed.

I found several hundred Jersey Cudweed in seed or flower here, an amazing sight and a new record for the area.

Laphangium luteoalbum

Nearby, along Gonvena Hill I found the fodder version of Salad Burnet. This is much bigger in all parts than the native form with deeply serrated large paired leaves and flower heads so large, you wonder at first if you've found Great Burnet.

This no doubt originated when the nearby Premier Inn was built some years ago and the surrounding areas seeded when the building work was finished. It's persisting all by itself as it often does in such situations.

Poterium sanguisorba ssp balearicum

It's surprising how Sea Milkwort can go unnoticed when not in flower. the leaves are reminiscent of a thin Sea Sandwort, but once you know them, you can't miss them. Fortunately, this patch by the River Camel upstream of Wadebridge was in flower.

Lysimachia maritima

On the last day of July, I managed my first visit to the China Clay waste areas around St. Austell. The dry, arid and barren soils often support some rare or unusual plants.

Yellow-wort was present in good numbers.

Blackstonia perfoliata

Very tiny Trailing St. John's wort were common and distracted the eye with their tiny yellow flowers dotting the whole area. I even managed to pick a rainy day in this long drought period to go out too!

Hypericum humifusum

Chamomile was present where the grasses were short, often in large numbers. They seem to be nearly all less than 6" tall and of course have a lovely smell if you crush one. They can't really be confused with the Mayweeds at all and Stinking Chamomile is a chalk specialist where Chamomile doesn't grow anyway.

Chamaemelum nobile

There were hundreds of tiny Lesser Centaury in the waste areas. Most were less than 2cm high and given the rain the purple flowers were closed. A useful tip for ID is that these have no basal rosette when in flower and Common Centaury does.

Centaurium pulchellum

My first Hawkweed of the Summer was this likely Narrow-leaved Hawkweed. They look great but are a hard group to identify. The leaves in the photo belong to Bracken though!

Hieracium umbellatum

 Here are the leaves of the above Hawkweed, quite distinctive aren't they.

 

 I found a spoilheap of china clay sand. This had a few patches of Birdsfoot growing on it.

The above was a standing height view of the plant, look how tiny the flowers are. Luckily, I have a good macro lens so you can see the beauty of them close up.

Ornithopus perpusillus

This same spoil heap had a small colony of Small Cudweed too, a lovely plant to stumble across.

Logfia minima

Below is a close up photo of the spores of a Polypody fern. You can just see the annulus rings which are the tiny black bits on the egg like spore sacs. To identify these for sure, you need to take a sample and view them under a microscope. You then count the rings to determine which of the three Polypodies this might be. Of course, being a major nerd and having bought a cheap microscope from Lidl recently, I can do this. I used the microscope to count the rings and this was Common Polypody (of course it was). Interestingly I have found that a visual identification based on the morphology of the leaves nearly always matches the microscopic identification too. Occasionally, but rarely, I get surprised! Details of how many rings each species can have can be found in Stace 4 complete with line drawings too.

Polypodium vulgare

This was probably the last English Stonecrop flower of the year for me from the same site as above near St. Austell. I include it as it was quite a popular post from me on Twitter. I think the raindrops on the flower resonated with people walking bone dry areas at the time.

Sedum anglicum

So the next time someone says lets build houses/retail units/roads or plant lots of conifers all over china clay waste areas, you should know that most of the above species would die out. There is no such thing as waste areas or wasteland. Such areas are home to many plants, some quite rare, that support a good deal of bio diversity in the resulting food chains above them. Develop the area and its all lost.

Anyway, that wraps up my July finds. August will follow soon, but still the drought persists. Yes, it rains occasionally, but it immediately evaporates or is sucked up by the stronger plants. So much so, that you can walk through a meadow of seeded brown grasses within two hours of rain and not get wet.

Until next time.

Regards

Dave

You can also follow me on Twitter: @Botany2021