Not sure whether to take part in #NewYearPlantHunt? Worrying that your #WildFlowerID skills won't be up to scratch? No problem: just use one of our spotter sheets for your area: bsbi.org/take-part/ac... Download & print it, or find all the spotter sheet plants on a ticklist on the #BSBIRecordingApp!

A dentist appointment in Lewes gave me enough #pavementplants for #thewinter10: Trailing Bellflower, Bristly Oxtongue, Dandelion, Petty Spurge, Guernsey Fleabane, Yarrow, Shepherd's Purse, Ivy-leaved Toadflax, Groundsel and Common Chickweed #wildflowerhour

Really enjoying #wildflowerhour tonight. There’s something particularly plucky and cheerful about plants blooming on the shortest day of the year #wintersolstice

A Cambridge-Ely #TheWinter10. Feverfew, Petty spurge, White dead nettle, Groundsel, Shepherd’s purse, Sweet violet, Common chickweed, Dandelion, Yarrow, Winter heliotrope and Daisy. #WildflowerHour

morning walk looking for occasional wild flowers for #WildflowerHour tonight - at 8-9 pm every Sunday, people post photos of wildflowers they have seen in the week. Fun to join in even if you only see one or two! or aim high for #TheWinter10 🌿🌿😊 ask for identification help if needbe 💚

23 signatures to get it to 10,000 - come on! sign and share - this is vitally important

Bit more cheese

Unbelievably, #DuvetKnowItsChristmas generates such good will on social media that over the years we've raised somewhere approaching a quarter of a million quid for homeless charities. If you can spare a bob or two, sling some to Centrepoint, and here's the link: www.gofundme.com/f/duvet-know...

Democracy dies in darkness. Getting the below post seen by as many people as possible would be very helpful 👇

In the final window of Nature’s Advent Calendar, she appears, silent as light — as if summoned by stillness itself. A Marbled White butterfly fairy, woven from winter light and patience. No ending, just wings held open — a reminder that wonder rests, waits, and rises again. #NaturesAdventCalendar

I do love these INVENTORY posts from @iammilliam.bsky.social - they are so packed with knowledge and obscure joys, but you don’t have to know all about music to appreciate the sweet nostalgia, the gentle humour or the brilliant wordcraft (is that a word? It should be). thanks again Andy x

open.spotify.com/episode/1cMI... The completely wonderful @backlisted.bsky.social episode of The Dark is Rising...🖤

Once many years ago worked in an office with the postcode SW1V 1EE, and a letter arrived beginning “Dear Mr Swiviee”. We wanted to reply from Mr Swiviee as our special office alias, but the boss wasn’t keen. (That V wouldn’t be there in that position now, they’ve changed the postcode format)

For anyone who does both land-based work and writing:

🎺🎺The @CalaisAppeal fundraiser just hit £20,000!!!!!🥳🤩🤩 This is amazing! They’re so close to reaching their goal 😭🙏🥰 Thank you so much everyone, let’s make it happen for them! www.justgiving.com/campaign/tog...

Has anyone got time to listen to this James Rebanks interview about farming? Because it's really very, very good: www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/...

My 14 year old son Luca took me here after cricket training today. He said there is hope in that sky Mum, I’ve never seen anything like it, the locals said there are half a million starlings here. Keep your families close, hug your children, help those who need us, do a 1000 piece puzzle, enjoy!

The remarkable @orkneyboreray.bsky.social have developed a licensed on-farm abattoir, ideal for native breeds, significantly reducing stress on animals. #Smallholders #Crofters #Farmers Please support the fundraiser if you can.

Love this:

Nostalgia has rarely been more beautiful: a wonderful thread.

Happy Winter Solstice folks!

A leaf-cutter bee’s turn to shine through a window of Nature’s Advent Calendar. Leaf by leaf, these deft makers cut and carry precise shapes to line their nests and protect their young. A quiet thank-you — to the bees, and to @brigitstrawbridge.bsky.social, a dear friend who helps hold me together.

The majority of Britons think important places for nature should have stronger protections. Only 2% think protections should be weakened... yet that’s where ministers keep pushing.

📢 UK momentum building for broadcast national emergency briefing - needed in all countries around world, now 🎤Watch letter to #Starmer &broadcasters youtu.be/c0NLZPUTH3g?... ✍️ Pls take 1 min to sign the letter yourself: www.nebriefing.org/open-letter-... 🙏🙏

We have recorded the Christmas Day episode, by Toutatis! 💥 @iammilliam.bsky.social @unamccormack.bsky.social

Enjoying @bsbiscotland.bsky.social’s botanical #adventcalendar:

Beneath the #Wiltshire Medieval hilltop town of Malmesbury lies a 9ha Iron Age hillfort Here looking east: Now (© Wilts and Gloucestershire Standard) and then (© Athelstan Museum) A wee thread for #HillfortsWednesday 🧵👇

Woodland ephemera

@wildflowerhour.bsky.social Finding these plants still flowering in the sheltered folds of our land felt like discovering quiet winter miracles Today’s Advent offering grew from that joy: a thimble-full of wildflowers, shared with love and a nod to those who celebrate our wild plants all year round

Yarrow in the meadow - still flowering for this week's #WildflowerHour

Outside the paywall for a week or so. www.cartoongravity.com/how-to-cope-...

A Teasel Christmas tree, alighted by a Holly Blue Fairy. Seed heads, lichen and meadow flowers gathered with care for ‘Nature’s Advent Calendar’, unfolding day by day. A reminder that light doesn’t always come from wires and switches, but from attention, devotion, and the stories we choose to carry

#nowReading The Flight of the Heron by D K Broster. Just the thing for a rainy afternoon. front cover of 1st edition 1925 (the edition pictured is on ABE Books, mine is much more ordinary looking) Set in 1745, tracing the friendship and the lives of two men who find themselves on opposite sides.

#NowListening God I love this song and I don’t even know what it’s about. Think this is yet another thing we have to thank the @backlisted.bsky.social team for 🧡 youtu.be/r9BQ6PxK7ss

Do you agree that AI should p*** off this Christmas! My mini linocuts make great, affordable little gifts. They're totally handmade; from drawing, to carving to printing and are also on handmade khadi paper (not made by me). #humanmade #shopsmall #handmadeisbest www.etsy.com/shop/SarahRo...

A miniature Christmas garland, strung with campion seed heads and shell beads, all threaded on willow-herb fibre. A tiny herb robert seed-head — ‘grannie’s needle’ — holds the thread. A tiny natural element, re-imagined creatively, can carry a little wild magic into the everyday world. #WildMagic

The Second Window. Once upon a time, there was a green-eyed Tabby Cat who ran a bookshop by the Christ Church gate of Canterbury Cathedral. It was a marvellous place, four stories high, with treasures on every shelf & free buttered toast, plum cake & hot sweet tea for all who visited.

A great adaptation of a brilliant novel that was ahead of its time

Handy round-up of books on #climate info - thankyou - Scientists on Survival is going on the TBR list. Non-fiction recommendations are so useful!

This evening’s Advent treasure is a Comma Butterfly Fairy, resting on a curl of hop vine — the plant her young depend upon. I love how butterflies carry their stories in partnership with the plants that raise them. A touch of true magic from the wild world meeting the soft magic of fairytale. #Fairy

Three reasons to love Common Tamarisk-moss, Thuidium tamariscinum: 1. It's gorgeous ✔️ 2. It's got a great name ✔️ 3. It's easy to identify ✔️✔️✔️ I was delighted to see lots of it in woodland at the Devil's Punchbowl at the weekend. #BonkersForBryophytes

The first day of my Nature-inspired Advent Calendar… tiny candlesnuff candles, each held in a campion seed-head candlestick. Candlesnuff fungus (Xylaria hypoxylon) is said to be bioluminescent — lit by the light of the moon, no matches required. A quiet start, glowing softly at winter’s threshold.

Ooh there was a @backlisted.bsky.social Hallowe’en episode a while ago, for which this would be a useful resource! Thank you

The first episode of Backlisted was published on 30th November 2015, ten years ago today. @backlisted.bsky.social ‘We can ask and ask but we can’t have again what once seemed ours forever.’ - J.L. Carr, A Month in the Country 🙏 www.backlisted.fm/episodes/1-j...

Signing this letter from National Emergency Briefing:

Engaging conversation on food policy and farming with @herdyshepherd.bsky.social. Full of interest, clarity, lack of jargon; down to earth, articulate and a fascinating listen. Recommended: www.bbc.com/audio/play/m...

Sent this article to my friend who teaches forest school – So interesting – www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Waiting in stationary traffic and noticed something I'd never seen before:

Has anyone got time to listen to this James Rebanks interview about farming? Because it's really very, very good: www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/...

A brilliant article about a community working together to learn about the planning system and regulatory frameworks: "the local environment is not a blank slate on which industrial development can be superimposed without consequence."