The hardy division of #NorfolkFloraGroup shunned a ‘yellow warning’ of ice and snow in favour of the yellow flowers of Buddle.. & 99 other flowering species! The Norfolk uplands produced Fumarias, Muehlenbeckia & Rubus vestitus in unseasonably excellent condition. #NYPH @bsbibotany.bsky.social

Day 2 of #NewYearPlantHunt: >800 surveys; >12,000 records; 522 species in bloom. In tonight's round-up: @danryannature.bsky.social reports from Cornwall; #12daysWild; wide media coverage following our joint @metoffice.gov.uk press release & 1st ever hybrid #NYPH x Pub Crawl bsbi.org/blog/2026/01...

Nineth cider of the day on the #NYPH pub crawl in Norwich and 91 species under our belt. Some great plants - a luxurious Pseudofumaria lutea mistaken for a hanging basket a fav.. scaling the castle.. and some great pubs. Top effort #NorfolkFloraGroup #NYPH Same next January

A cold start in the early morning at Menai Bridge today where 3 members of #Anglesey Flora Group carried out the #NYPH We found 47 species, up on the 34 we found on the same route last year. @bsbibotany.bsky.social @bsbicymru.bsky.social

Top effort from #NorfolkFloraGroup for our 1st #NYPH of ‘26 in Thetford. Highlights including Early Sand Grass Mibora minima & both sspp of Annual Knawel Scleranthus annuus ssp annuus & ssp polycarpos. 75spp - Currently ranking 2nd on @bsbibotany.bsky.social list of longest lists. Norwich tomorrow!

Happy New Year! Early bed for me to be fresh for a #NYPH or four over the next few days. Snowdrop season is beginning out there so I wish you all a wonderful ‘26 with some fine and sunlit double Galanthus x valentinei from Norfolk’s Snowdrop Acre

Now, we wouldn't dream of encouraging people to get drunk - BSBI is a charity after all! - but this #NewYearPlantHunt & pub crawl hybrid in Norwich does look like fun. Feel free to join @bramblebotanist.bsky.social & co or set up a similar event in your area! Details here: bsbi.org/take-part/ev...

Male and female flowers of Hazel just opening ready for #NYPH at Eastnor Deer Park today. #Herefordshire #WildflowerHour

The last 5 of my 25 #theWinter10 😊 - Groundsel with bonus Forgetmenot, Yarrow, Red Deadnettle, Wood Avens and Common Stinging Nettle. I think I’ve worked out the route for my annual Bradford-on-Avon #NYPH 🙂

Updated route for the @bsbibotany.bsky.social Norwich #NYPH pub crawl (to accommodate opening hrs). 30mins between pubs, 15 mins at each.. should be doable in daylight hours! Murderers> Red Lion> Golden Sun> Fat Cat> Garden House> Coach&Horses> Murderers! All welcome 2nd Jan 10:30 at pub#1

Interrupted Brome Bromus interruptus is a rare/extinct-in-the-wild English endemic. Perhaps it has a future as a garden plant - it looked lovely spreading through my cottage garden borders last summer

Last summer I checked on the local Dactylorhiza incarnata ‘gemanna’ (pics 1&2 2020).. now it is being pretty standard incarnata incarnata (pics 3&4), giving weight to the theory it’s just a well grown version of the nominate form of Early Marsh Orchid #OrchidChallenge #wildflowerhour

Fly Orchid Ophrys insectifera at its largest Suffolk location last summer #OrchidChallenge #WildflowerHour

Lax-flowered Orchid Anacamptis laxiflora in the Channel Islands last summer, including a few colour forms #orchidchallenge #wildflowerhour

In summer 2024 Norfolk’s first ever Military Orchid Orchis militaris popped up. Of somewhat suspicious origin and soon felled by herbivore unknown. No sign of it in 2025. Spectacular while it was here though! #orchidchallenge #wildflowerhour

The wonderful Guernsey Fern Asplenium x microdon, the hybrid of Lanceolate Spleenwort A. billotii and Hartstongue A. scolopendrium, growing with both parent species on the banks of a shady lane on Guernsey last summer

Welsh Mudwort Limosella australis grown from strandline fragments at Pwllheli harbour. Unlike Mudwort L. aquatica (last pic) australis has undifferentiated petiole/leaf & surprisingly strongly freesia-scented white flowers #wildflowerhour

In an attempt to stave off the glooming I’m revisiting photos from summers past (previously shared on ‘the other place’).. & thought I’d share some again here.. In summer 2024 #NorfolkFloraGroup visited a beautiful extensive grassland restoration over patterned ground in west Norfolk. Names on pics

Just 2 sleeps to go before the #BSBI #NewYearPlantHunt!!! bsbi.org/take-part/ac... Here in sunny #Norfolk, the #NorfolkFloraGroup is running 3 events: Thetford on 1st Jan; Norwich (incl @bramblebotanist.bsky.social's pub crawl) on 2nd Jan and Sheringham on 3rd Jan. Join us. Make new friends! 🥰

Excellent prolonged views of a Black-winged Kite this morning! #Norfolkbirding

A Black-winged Kite in Norfolk! Crazy close roadside views of it flapping and hunting over marshes beside the Ant.

Two Monkey-Puzzels Araucaria araucana seedlings underneath a mature tree in Lincs. Appears to be the 10th record and 6th & 7th individual self-set trees in recordable situations.

200 plant species recorded around my village in a few hours this afternoon! And a very relaxing laneside Xmas lunch!

A few fun kerbside plants around Norfolk this week: Winter-cherry Solanum diflorum, a cultivated form of Black Nightshade Solanum nigrum, Mexican Hat Plant Kalanchoe daigremontiana & a population of 22 culinary Thyme Thymus vulgaris #wildflowerhour #NorfolkFloraGroup

As far as we know this type of #NYPH has never before been attempted. Join us. Make botanical history!!! bsbi.org/take-part/ac...

A scout about a sunny Norwich to plan the #NYPH / pub crawl route. Highlights included a stand of gigantic Black Nightshade (Solanum nigrum - or might it be something related?), and a pair of Mexican Hat Plant Kalanchoe daigremontiana in a pavement crack which seems to be a GB 1st!

Jo demonstrates there’s no need for botanists to be hibernating. 100 spp/monad in December is certainly worth wrapping up for. There’s a bonus of earlier than usual post-botanising pubs to discuss specimens too.. and it’s not just December, we have #NYPH & then it’s necrobotany & cryobotany season!

Seriously Spotify ‘wrapped’? I’m not sure whether to be humbled or offended.

Good luck little Cottonweeds!

Mounting specimens this evening & found a not so helpful note from field season me ‘NFN?’ - an abbreviation well known in medical situations here but in this case indicating ‘New for Norfolk’.. Rubus permundus, well away from it’s Surrey stronghold. #wildflowerhour

Godstow Abbey and its assemblage of medieval medicinal plants.. all looking a bit seasonal this morning. Good King Henry Chenopodium bonus-henricus, Aaron’s Rod Verbascum thapsus & Birthwort Aristolochia clematitis

An extensive patch of Pale Galingale Cyperus eragrostis on the wet edge of a beet pad in east Norfolk. Plants growing in ephemeral shallow water over concrete. #NorfolkFloraGroup #Wildflowerhour

The second Rubus hybrid seen with #NorfolkFloraGroup today was Rubus ulmifolius x vestitus, a common hybrid worth knowing. Intermediate with parents: hairy purple primocanes, rounded terminal lobes with white undersides. Inflorescences typically not developing fruit.

Despite the season it was a good day for brambles with #NorfolkFloraGroup This is one of the Rubus x loganobaccus group hybrids which include Loganberry - raspberry x one of the fruticosus agg, in this case the second parent is probably Rubus hindii. They have raspberry-like leaves & bramble stems

Cladonia ciliata var. tenuis shows P+ red and looks very cool in the process. P is Para-phenylenediamine, one of the three main chemical reagents used to spot-test lichens. The other two are K (Potassium hydroxide 10%) and C (hypochlorite or household bleach).

One-flowered glasswort (Salicornia disarticulata) still looking good on a North Norfolk saltmarsh. Distinctive little thing once known. The single flowers seem to typically turn reddish. Most other glassworts had died off for the winter already.

My very talented friend Úrsula is producing another wonderful book of her amazing botanical illustrations, this time focusing on that scarcest of colours in nature.. check out Blue Flower. The Kickstarter is almost there! www.kickstarter.com/projects/ink...

The autumnal colours of Rubus vestitus..

Another obscure road verge, another Mediterranean fruit tree.. Hot on the heels of last week’s self-set Olive Olea europea today’s #NorfolkFloraGroup star find was a self-set Peach Prunus persica!

A fantastic haul of beautiful Waxcaps and associated grassland fungi at Felbrigg Hall in north #Norfolk with @waxcapscooch.bsky.social today. One of the top sites in the county.

An attractively ruffled semi-double Feverfew Tanacetum pathenium on the allotment #Wildflowerhour

Hello, is anybody out there? Mentha x verticillata (Whorled Mint) candidate from Cinderford Brook, Forest of Dean. Robust, inflorescence terminated in leaves, stamen included within corolla. @wildflowerhour.bsky.social, have the botanical community moved to bluesky? Must try to re-find folk...

A new Red List for Vascular Plants in Great Britain has just been published - the first update for twenty years 🌿 So what is a Red List, and why does it matter? What does this new report tells us about the state of Britain’s flora?

Brilliant to see the #GBRedList making a report on CBBC newsround, headlined by the tale of Fen Orchid recovery. The future of our wonderful plants is in their hands - let's try not to drop the baton before we can hand it over! www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/ar... @plantlifeuk.bsky.social

Pepperpot Earthstar Myriostoma coliforme at one of its very few GB locations. Pleasingly the scientific name means ‘like a colander with many holes’. Note also the columns that hold the sac aloft.

20 years on from the first #GBRedList for vascular plants - what's changed? 285 taxa have become more threatened. Critically Endangered up from 35 to 55 taxa, Endangered up from 90 to 117 taxa, Vulnerable up from 220 to 261 taxa 😱☠️ Action needed now! Well done @bsbibotany.bsky.social and partners

As usual, @markavery.bsky.social has it right. Things are not getting better for our wild plants The 20-year efforts of #BSBImembers & the botanical community gave us #PlantAtlas2020, which provides the evidence base for much of this #GBRedList assessment. Your #botany records make a difference!

Major revision of #GBRedList of plants published today shows 25% of our native & archaeophyte flora threatened with extinction. Many iconic widespread species classified as threatened for first time including Betony, Marsh Marigold, Devil’s-bit Scabious and Harebell. Another wake-up call for action!

New #GBRedList for vascular plants evaluated 1,720 species. 26% (up from 23% in 2005) assessed as threatened. Common Restharrow, Marsh-marigold & Harebell: all Vulnerable. Alpine Gentian: Endangered. Work was led by Pete Stroh from @bsbibotany.bsky.social & funded by @naturalengland.bsky.social

Well done all involved in years of data gathering, analysis, coordination & funding for this new GB red list. Dedicated work by top botanists. And thanks to the brilliant conservation orgs & land managers stemming the haemorrhaging of biodiversity too. Many declines but also some glimmers of hope