Down the Lanes of North Cornwall - Mid April 2022

 The botanical County Recorder for Cornwall asked if I would mind surveying sites for Greater Chickweed (Stellaria neglecta) within my area. It's not a very exciting plant to look at, but it was one I had not seen before, so I agreed to give it a go.

I duly made a list of areas where they had been previously found (often decades before) and started off in the evenings for an hour or two to look for them. It made sense to record everything else I saw too, as not many botanists go down these country lanes very often to record!

As such, this blog is a compilation of interesting, pretty or rare plants I found along the way. This included some stunning insects such as this Orange-tip butterfly resting on Greater Stitchwort.

 

  A Bloody nose Beetle (Timarcha tenebricosa)

 scuttling through the undergrowth, rather clumsily I might add.

 At this time of the year, many plants have leaves but no flowers. It's then a challenge to identify them from leaves alone. The one below, I kept seeing and worked out that it was Corn Parsley. Apparently this is common here in Cornwall. Common Valerian and Saw-wort are other examples I keep finding in leaf only.

Petroselinum segetum

 Common Ramping Fumitory is very common along the lanes and its large flowers (11-13mm) and loose heads of flowers make it stand out. There are sub species for it, but I no longer try and work these out given that the experts believe they are more than likely varietal rather than actual subspecies. Time will tell I suppose.

Fumaria muralis

It didn't take long to find Greater Chickweed, and over the next couple of weeks, I found hundreds of them. So far, I have found them in all places where they used to be except one. That's offset by me finding a new site too. So good news locally for this species anyway.

Here it is, not terribly impressive but about twice the size of the usual Common Chickweed found in the street or field edges. Hairy sepals and pedicels are named var. neglecta and glabrous ones are var. elizabethae.

 Stellaria neglecta var. elizabethae

 Grasses is an area of botany where I struggle. Having said that, I can identify all the obvious ones and they are coming into flower fast now. This one with a compact spike of flowers is Meadow Foxtail.

Alopecurus pratensis

 

In north Cornwall, rivers and streams, brooks and rivulets abound, so many areas are permanently wet. A peek over a small bridge revealed these wonderful Marsh Marigolds growing in complete shade under trees around one such wet and boggy area. Although these are sold in garden centres, they are actually a native plant and are widespread where conditions are right for them.

Caltha palustris

 Another wet loving species is Butterbur. Unfortunately, these ones I found at a strangely named place called Washaway, had gone to seed. I joked online that they were Cornish Lizard Orchids, which raised a few eyebrows. I might repeat that post on April 1st next year!

Petasites hybridus

 There was an abundance of common wildflowers, turning country lanes into a riot of colour, such as these Primroses.

Primula vulgaris

 Wild Garlic or Ramsons

Allium ursinum

Greater Stitchworts and Red Campion looking amazing.

Stellaria holostea and Silene dioica

 

 

Even Common Sorrel looked great and there were hundreds of them along the lanes.

Rumex acetosa

Several trees are now also flowering. Here is one I've seen online many times, but until now, never seen in the wild. It's the fruits of an Elm. Which species I don't know, its taxonomy is very complicated with clones and hybrids making it all far from easy, thus I record all Elms as:

Ulmus

Along one lane, I found at least 30m of these Pink Purslanes along both road verges. The only habitation near was a working farm, with no farmhouse or other garden near, so I don't know how they arrived here.

Here's one in amongst the Greater Stitchworts that line most rural roads now.

Claytonia sibirica

Moschatel or Town Hall Clock, is a common plant in the ancient woodlands of Kent, but here in Cornwall, it is very rare, so I was both pleased and surprised to find a patch in flower by a road verge under planted Beech trees. I suspect they came with the trees inadvertantly when the trees were planted.

Adoxa moschatellina

You see some unusual things too, such as this post box with its knitted Easter themed hat on and in another village was a red phone box full of books to read and swap for free. All signs of a good community spirit, sadly lacking elsewhere.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Shining Cranesbill, abundant on verges, but mostly near villages or towns.

Geranium lucidum

A dried up muddy pudlle had Ivy leaved Water Crowfoot growing in it. Blotchy leaves shaped rather like Ivy and tiny flowers identified them.

Ranunculus hederaceus

Something that is odd is that Cornwall has retained its population of Bluebells despite losing most of its woodland. The species easily jumped onto Cornish walls (made of earth and stone) and colonised them along with new woodland too. So it great to find some large stands of them here too.

Hyacinthoides non-scripta

 Several areas near me are home to Climbing Corydalis. I'd only ever seen this twice before, once at Dungeness and the other at Hothfield Heath,, both in Kent. But the flora is different here and this plant is pretty much all over the place here.

Ceratocapnos claviculata

 There's always plenty of non native plants to record too, especially near habitation. This is an escaped Wallflower.

Sisymbrium cheiri

 I have found several Early Purple Orchids from their rosettes alone, but now they are coming into flower. They seem to be mostly small and unassuming and are loathe to open their flowers while the cold weather persists. They had better hurry up though, as the council mowers are already out and about in force. These ones escaped being mowed by about one foot!

Orchis mascula

 It's now the time of the year when Lesser Celandines can be split into subspecies. As they age, subspecies fertilis produces lots of flowers among leaves; subspecies verna however, has none or few weedy looking flowers and reproduces by means of bulbils that form at the base of the leaves, as shown below. Have a rummage through the leaves and you'll find them. They generally are found in very shady areas.

Ficaria verna subspecies verna

 These are the sort of lanes I have walked, no footpaths, but then virtually no traffic. If you happen to meet anyone they all chat and are friendly and genuinely interested in what I am doing. It's so refereshing after living in the South East where most people are paranoid about crime and immediately think I'm up to no good.

So, I have had a good time exploring the lanes looking for this little plant and found lots to keep me interested. I hope you found it interesting too, though I apologise for it being a bit long. There was so much, I left out many finds too!

Stellaria neglecta var. neglecta

Take care

Dave

 

The Hunt for Sand Crocus in Cornwall 08/04/22

 

 Sand Crocus is a very rare native plant, only found at Dawlish Warren, Devon and on a couple of rocky outcrops near Polruan, Cornwall, on mainland UK. Online photos of some Dawlish plants now being in flower led me to plan a trip to see them. Billy, a young botanist from Bodmin joined me and we set off to see them.

One issue was that the flowers are very small and only open in bright sun. As we left  it started raining and it was quite cold too, so would they be open today? I hoped the sunny spells bewteen the showers would be enough for them to be visible at least, but I wasn't very optimistic.

We had also decided to record all species we could find in the monad after being prompted by the County Recorder to do so. All recording is now worthwhile as from 2020 we are in a new 20 year date class. As such, all records after 2020 are in effect new and valuable to show continuity of species in that area.

Having decided to record everything we could, it became apparent that, like most botanists, it would take some time to get out of the car park as it was full of species. This one really caught our eye.

It's White Ramping Fumitory, but a rare form that turns white to almost crimson as the flowers age and are pollinated. 

Fumaria capreolata subspecies capreolata forma speciosa

Below: look at how crimson the flowers have turned on this one, beautiful!

After recording lots of species, we arrived at the first Sand Crocus site. What a view!

The Sand Crocuses grow on the very thin soils over these granite outcrops to avoid competition from more robust species. It was a pretty cold Easterly breeze and the sun was more in than out. Where were they?

 It was Billy who raised a yell as he found the first one.

He'd found one! Barely open in the poor conditions.

We then scanned the area and found lots more, over 40 in fact!

There was enough sun out after all.

Romulea columnae

 

These were a bit more open and easier to see.

A habitat photo. Note the foreboding sky! In fact, it hailed on us too.

 

At the second place for these (another rocky outcrop nearby) we only found 2 plants in flower, which wasn't so good. However, there may have been a lot more plants there but they were pretty much invisible without an open flower. Here's me (looking very old) having a closer look.

Nearby was an interesting Dandelion with a small capitula and small dissected leaves making it a Section Erythrosperma species. Handily, I found lots of these last year in Kent and had them verified by the BSBI referee, so hopefully, I can identify a few of them now with some confidence.

Taraxacum lacistophyllum

The final plant of note from here was a plant I usually find (though rarely) in arable fields. There was a stand of Field Woundwort growing well in a rabbit scrape. It needs disturbance to germinate and here, rabbits provided it.

Stachys arvensis

As there was plenty of time left in the day, we decided to pay a visit to Lantic Bay nearby. This is a shellgrit and shingle beach surrounded by high cliffs with a long walk down (and back up 120m in fact). The flora is somewhat different to usual as the shellgrit allowed for more calcareous plants to grow here.

 On the way down the cliff, we came across a lot of rosettes of Early Purple Orchids, but sadly, if any were to flower, it was too early for them yet. Look at the markings on this one!

Orchis mascula 

Here'a a view from halfway down the cliff to the beach

However, the top of the beach was sparsely vegetated and contained some nice plants such as Sea Spurge and Sea Radish as shown below.

Raphanus raphanistrum subspecies maritimum

 I found this bug on vegetation on the beach.

https://www.britishbugs.org.uk/heteroptera/Coreidae/enoplops_scapha.html says about this bug -

"A large and distinctive dark grey squashbug with cream markings on the connexivum. Early instar larvae have very spiny antennae and a green abdomen. Later instars are superficially similar to the much commoner Coreus marginatus (Dock Bug) but the abdominal tergites are more pointed.

A local species which is confined to coastal cliffs and sand dunes between Kent and north Wales, with outlying populations on the north Yorkshire coast. The foodplants are various Asteraceae".

Enoplops scapha - Boat Bug

At the top of the beach was a small cave with fresh water dripping down from the roof. Growing about this was the largest and most impressive Maidenhair Fern I had yet seen. It must have been 3 feet long hanging down from the roof.

Adiantum capillus-veneris

Before the long climb back up the cliff, we had a sit down on a log. Whilst there I spotted another delicate Dandelion. This one turned out to be Taraxacum oxonianum

 

The last flower I photographed here was a stand of Sea Rocket. Its seeds wash up on the highest of tides and start off the next generation of plants. They are quite common around the coasts.

Cakile maritima

The vegetated beach at Lantic Bay. It was a long way back up again!

So ended a great day out. Billy was great to be around and it was good to talk botany with another person interested in the subject. We found the Sand Crocus and overall, the sites were in good condition so they should be around in the future too.

I hope you liked this blog, take care.

Dave

Follow me on Twitter - @botany2021

Bogs and Dunes, early April 2022

 Near to Wadebridge is a bog and heath called Rosenannon Downs managed by Cornwall Wildlife Trust. I thought I would visit as I had never seen Bog Myrtle before and it should be in flower. It was only a short drive and as soon as I drove onto the heath, I saw hundreds of Bog Myrtle, flashing like gold specks in the afternoon sun.

As you can see, it is a small woody shrub with golden coloured "cones" that contain the pollen and stigmas.

Myrica gale

It was nice finding something easily for a change!

Here's a habitat photo. The grassy strip by the road is where the Dandelions were found mentioned later on.

 

I had a walk about to see what else might be flowering. In the damper places I found plenty of Lousewort in flower, a parasitic plant, common in boggy habitats.

 Pedicularis sylvatica

One of thousands of Lesser Centaury amongst a carpet of Opposite Leaved Golden Saxifrage.

Ficaria verna and Chrysosplenium oppositifolium

This young rush was coming into flower. I hadn't seen this before, but found it to be the Black Bog Rush, a common plant here. The young inflorescences really were quite dark, which gives the plant its name. The plant eventually forms a large tussock and the black fruits persist into the next season too.

Schoenus nigricans

A very common fern here is the Soft Shield Fern. The fronds have a thumb shaped basal leaf and they run paralell to the stem.

Polystichum setiferum

Along the road verge (see habitat photo for Bog Myrtle above) was a grassy strip, kept short with rabbit grazing. Dotted all over it were Dandelions, so I took a sample to key out at home. This one appears to be Taraxacum brittanicum though I will ask the BSBI Taraxacum referee to confirm this later.

Once home, I noticed a Fumitory growing on bare earth in my garden. The concolourous top petal (all the same colour) means this could only be Tall Ramping Fumitory, a nice find for a garden.

Fumaria bastardii

The next day, I took a late afternoon walk on fixed dunes near Rock. This is a calcareous site, so the flora is completely different to most areas here.

Not much is showing yet, but in the sand dunes were carpets of Rue-leaved Saxifrage, a tiny, sticky plant that turns red with age. If you look at the photo below, notice the moss growing around it. This plant is barely larger than the moss!

Saxifraga tridactylites

There were hundreds of tiny specks of blue in the dunes. These were the flowers of the minute Early Forget-me-not. If you find a flower 2mm across, that's a large one.

Myosotis ramosissima

I then came acrosss a rather attrctive Euphorbia that I hadn't ever seen before. I guessed that it might be Portland Spurge and I later confirmed that it was. The stems were a deep red and it grew on the sand and in cracks in the rocks too.

Euphorbia portlandica

My last photo was of Cornsalad, rather small in this harsh environment. Seeds are need to identify them to species level and it's too early yet for them.

Valerianella

 So ended my trip this day. The flora is awakening and soon I won't be able to keep up with what comes into flower. I can't wait!

Blackthorn framing the wonderful scenery that is local to me now.

Prunus spinosa

 

Take care

Dave

Follow me on Twitter @botany2021