Botany in Dunes and Clifftops, Cornwall Early May 2023

 I thought it would be a good time to visit the site for Mountain Everlasting near Perranporth. I had seen them last year, but was disapoointed with the photos of these tiny plants, so I intended to try and put that right. So in the first week of May I headed off and if I had time I would perhaps explore some clifftop areas too near Perranporth Airfield, where this plant had been found many years ago.

It didn't take long to find them on the dunes, they form large patches of silvery hairy leaves that stand out from 50m away. Here's a series of photos of this lovely, rare little plant. It has male and female flowers on different plants.

Antennaria dioica

Of course, Spring is the time for annual plants to flower and the dunes were full of Mouse-ear species. It can be tricky sorting them out as many are very small. Sea Mouse-ear was the dominant species, which mostly has only 4 petals so is easy to distinguish. I looked hard for any with 5 petals and sure enough I found a patch. Close examination of the hairs and bracts showed the plant below to be Little Mouse-ear, the flowers only about 5mm across.

 

Cerastium semidecandrum

The first Eyebrights were in flower, a hemi-parastic species that steals some of its nutrients from nearby plants. They are often hard to identify, but this one below was obviously Western Eyebright, given it had 4 flowers around the stem, all opposite. They can quite tall, up to around 10cm or so, but rabbit grazing keeps them small.

Euphrasia tetraquetra

Portland Spurge is a coastal plant, often found in dunes and sea cliffs in Cornwall. It has a prostrate habit and as the plant ages, the stems turn a crimson red. The bracts underneath the "flower" structure are shaped like a pair of Ace of Spades from a card deck, the lookalike Sea Spurge doesn't have them shaped like that and rarely turns red. Look also for  prominent single vein on the leaf undersides.

Euphorbia portlandica

In my last blog, I featured Heath Milkwort, explaining that it had opposite leaves at the base of the stem and liked acid soils. The one below looks very similar, but it is Common Milkwort, found on neutral to calcareous soils. It has larger, alternate leaves all the way up the stem. Sand dunes here are slightly calcareous as there is a proportion of shell grit within it, shells being made from calcium of course. Note that the flower colour can be blue, white or pink.

Polygala vulgaris

I was pleasantly surprised to come across a large patch of Small-flowered Buttercups by a sandy, but damp path. It's an uncommon annual plant, but it's popped up quite a bit this Spring, probably due to the wet April. Note how the plant avoids longer grass areas completely.

Ranunculus parviflorus

Below is the habitat for Mountain Everlasting, the silvery patches being made up of hundreds of plants.

Of course, I found plenty of other species, but I will move on now. From here, I made a short drive to an area by Perranporth Airfield and surveyed the coast path and public footpaths in that area.

 

Close to the car, I found carpets of Heath Pearlwort, a lovely little plant, like Procumbent Pearlwort but on steroids with much larger petals. Having said that, they are still only about 8mm across and have the habit of reflecting light and bleaching out a decent photograph.

 

Sagina subulata

Where the path skirted the airfield, I found Smith's Pepperwort in flower, about 20 plants. It's uncommon, but almost always coastal or coastal arable, though I did find it once on a rural Cornish lane.

Lepidium heterophyllum

Hairy Greenweed was common along the cliff coastal path, interweaving in and out of the other flora. It's not only found at The Lizard. It can be confused with Dyer's Greenweed but that flowers a month later and lacks the hairy keel petal and stems.

Genista pilosa

Sea Campion is a common coastal plant around much of the UK, but this was the first time I had seen one completely lacking red pigment (anthothyacine deficient or leucistic). It certainly looked odd, and the normal coloured ones were nearby. I guess it's due to a gene mutation. I don't know if this is found elsewhere apart from Cornwall and Devon. If this was a Bee Orchid, it would be called var. chlorantha and people would come from miles around to see it.

Silene uniflora var albiflora

Pale Dog Violets have been recorded here in the past, but appear to have dies out, at least for now. The species needs distubance to germinate like a fire or earthworks, so they might come back in the future if that happens. They frequently hybridise with the more numerous Common Dog Violet, which dotted the area in a bewildering array of colur forms.

I found a plant that perplexed me and spent an hour trying to work the one below out. Heath and Pale Dog Violets have also been recorded here in the past, so there were several hybrid possibilites with this plant. I eventually concluded it was just a Common Dog Violet after all.

To determine tricky violets like this one, you really need the BSBI Viola Handbook, which has a wealth of information on each Viola species (includes Pansies) and their hybrids.

Viola riviniana

I came to the area of clifftop where the Mountain Everlasting had been found, I think from memory, about 1996. Unfortunately, I found the area had mostly scrubbed over with a sward way too high for them to compete. It needs cutting, grazing or fire to see if they might still come back from a buried seed bank. 

What I did find though, were about 100 flowering Heath Spotted Orchids. This took me by surprise, as usually they don't start flowering until June. As usual, there was an amazing display of petal colours and patterns.

Dactylorhiza maculata

 

Below are the same plants, but photographed from above. 

A change of perspective often gives good results, give it a try.

There has been a worrying lack of insects this Spring, so when I see some I can photograph, I do so. I suspect the sudden massive decline to be caused by last year's drought, combined with habitat loss, pollution and excessive use of herbicides in agriculture.

Hairy Shield-bug - Dolycoris baccarum

Common Green Shield-bug - Palomena prasina

A view of the area's industrial past, a cap over an old mine shaft, now taken over by Gorse and Thrift.

So ended my second trip out for May. Of course, what I didn't know then was that it wouldn't rain again for another 4-5 weeks. I think the plants knew it and many flowered weeks early to set seed before drought got to them. Amazing how plants do that!

Take care

Dave

The Lizard in Early May 2023

 I thought it would be a good idea to show readers what happens to our validated botanical records, so for each species, I have included a link to the BSBI 2020 Atlas webpage. Here it shows you the UK distribution, a species trend, whether it's doing well or not (most are not), photographs of most species and a summary for it. I hope you make use of it and who knows, become a botanical or biological recorder yourself?

 I've seen thousands of Green-winged Orchids in Kent and Sussex previously, but I thought it would be nice to see the Cornish ones, so I headed off to The Lizard area where I knew some might be found. It didn't take too long to find them, but they only grew in short turf around rocky outcrops back from the sea and were few in number, compared to those pristine inland meadows of SE England with thousands of plants in them.

See https://plantatlas2020.org/atlas/2cd4p9h.6y71f0

They were pretty much all this colour and ranged from about 6 to 15cm tall, so they were quite dwarfed too. What was different about them was the flora they grew with, so there was a nice combination of Spring Squill growing amongst them, something you don't see further East.

Anacamptis morio

Not far away from them were acres of dry heath, typically with Heather with Cross-leaved Heath in Purple Moor Grass grassland. Intertwining amongst them were lots of Petty Whin, a small, weakly spiny shrub much like a miniature Gorse. 

Genista anglica

Petty Whin has undergone a dramatic decline over the last century, you can read all about it here - https://plantatlas2020.org/atlas/2cd4p9h.8n8

 Also on the dry heath, but usually by paths, were the rich blue flowers of Heath Milkwort.

Polygala serpyllifolia

 

It can tricky to tell Common Milkwort apart from this species, but to do so you have to look at the base of the stem. In Heath Milkwort, the leaves will be opposite (or if fallen off, leaf scars will be opposite), in Common Milkwort they are alternate all up the stem. Furthermore, it is rare for Common Milkwort to grow on acidic soils, so habitat often narrows your options down too.

See: https://plantatlas2020.org/atlas/2cd4p9h.fka

 Dwarf roses were dotted amongst the heath too, these were Burnet Roses which have not only thorns but impressive rows of sharp bristles up the stem too. Later in the year, they will have black hips (seed pods) unlike the usual roses that have red ones.

See: https://plantatlas2020.org/atlas/2cd4p9h.5k8

Rosa spinosissima

Procumbent Pearlwort (below) is a common plant, both in the countryside, but also in towns in pavement cracks. It normally has four petals and mostly lacks any petals, but here I found a large plant with 4 and 5 petals on it, so I have included it to show the variation in this species.

See: https://plantatlas2020.org/atlas/2cd4p9h.m20

Sagina procumbens

 

I had never seen Eyelash Fungus before and from online photos, I had assumed they were about 2-3cm across. On the damper places on the heath, but especially on paths, I noticed orange/red tiny blobs on the ground and eventually bent down to look closer. Of course, it was this fungus. The first photo below was the biggest one which was about 1cm across, look at those lashes!

Scutellinia scutellata

One of the dominant plants here was the Black Bog-Rush, so called after its very dark coloured fruiting heads. It's a tussocky plant with stiff leaves that end abruptly in its seedhead as shown in the second photo below. It has a quite Westerly distribution and is often found on damp, acidic moors, bogs and heaths.

See: https://plantatlas2020.org/atlas/2cd4p9h.m3b

Schoenus nigricans

 

Changing Forget-me-not is fairly common in Cornwall, but I only recently became aware that there are two sub-species. In subspecies discolor, the flowers start off yellow and turn blue (I've not found one yet), and in subspecies dubia they start off white or cream and turn blue. Below is the latter.

See: https://plantatlas2020.org/atlas/2cd4p9h.5dz

 

Myosotis discolor subspecies dubia

 

In the same area were hundreds of Adder's Tongue (below) which are actually ferns, just very small ones.The area had been mowed a few weeks prior to my visit and without mowing or grazing, the scrub would out-compete them and they would disappear.

See: https://plantatlas2020.org/atlas/2cd4p9h.y9x

 

Ophioglossum vulgatum

 

Nearer the coast were patches of the rare Western Clover. These patches would never grow directly exposed to the sea, but would be behind large rocks close to the cliff edges, thus the salt spray reduces competitive plants from crowding them out, but they cannot withstand the full force of storms. Below it was growing with Spring Squill behind just such a rock.

See: https://plantatlas2020.org/atlas/2cd4p9h.cpn

Trifolium occidentale 

 

 Back on the heath and there were lots of trees, though  none had trunks as we usually see them. This was Creeping Willow, which rarely gets much off the ground and intertwines through the undergrowth. It's most noticeable when it flowers as below. Otherwise, the leaves fade into the green of other plants un-noticed.

See: https://plantatlas2020.org/atlas/2cd4p9h.1tf

Salix repens

 

 

Pale Dog Violets were also scattered about the dry heath. The flowers are usually a bit larger than Common Dog Violets and the petals can be white to faintly purple. Their leaves are longer too with small teeth on the far edges and tip (1st photo below). They hybridise frequently with the Common Dog Violet and I found a hybrid clump not far away.

 

 

See: https://plantatlas2020.org/atlas/2cd4p9h.w5f

 

Viola lactea 

Whilst there I had to pay a visit to The Lizard village car park as it contains some unusual plants. In the car park can be found Greek Sea Spurrey, but I couldn't find any in flower. While looking for flowers, I came across Sand Spurrey which has a larger (though still tiny) flower and leaf like bracts below the flower (Greek has shortened bracts).It is also far less glandular hairy than Greek Sea Spurrey.

See: https://plantatlas2020.org/atlas/2cd4p9h.cm5

Spergularia rubra

The car park is also well known for having a population of Red Shepherd's Purse. Unlike the usual form, the whole plant is red, stems, branches and pods.

See: https://plantatlas2020.org/atlas/2cd4p9h.b5e

Capsella rubella

 

My final plant species is the lovely Cornish or Western Ramping Fumitory, endemic to Cornwall.

See: https://plantatlas2020.org/atlas/2cd4p9h.558

 

It has the largest flower of the Fumitories in the UK upto 14-15mm and a white rim to the spanner head shaped top petal. This tells it apart from all the other species. This plant was at least three feet wide and scrambling up other plants to about 5 feet tall.

Fumaria occidentalis 

So ended a nice day out to The Lizard area. I didn't go and visit the rarest clovers site as it was in the opposite direction to where I wanted to go. I also looked for Pygmy Rush but was a few weeks early, but I am sure I will find it later in the month when I return. 

Take Care

Dave