Tuesday 30 January 2024

Interview with BSBI President Micheline Sheehy Skeffington: Part One


BSBI President Micheline Sheehy Skeffington
BSBI has welcomed female members since its inception in 1836, although this hasn’t always been reflected in the choice of President – there have only been three women Presidents so far: Mary Briggs, from 1998 to 2000; Lynne Farrell, from 2019 to 2022 – here is the interview with Lynne, whose monthly blogposts helped botanists stay in touch while we couldn’t meet in person because of the lockdowns; and then in November 2022, Lynne handed over to Micheline Sheehy Skeffington.

Micheline is both the third female BSBI President and the second from the Republic of Ireland (David Webb was the first, from 1989 to 1991). At the 2023 British & Irish Botanical Conference, Micheline delivered the keynote presentation on ‘Ireland’s Lusitanian Flora – mining, smuggling, pilgrimages and the Ericaceae’. If you were unable to attend the Conference, you can watch this video of Micheline’s presentation.

Micheline's presentation at the
2023 British & Irish Botanical Conference
Image: J. Common 

I caught up with Micheline to find out more about her back story and to hear what she’s been up to in her first year at the helm of the leading botanical society in Britain and Ireland. Here is the first instalment of my interview with our President.

LM: So Micheline, before you tell us about your Presidency, could we go right back to the beginning and ask how you first got interested in botany – has it been a lifelong passion? How did you get started?

MSS: Well I grew up in a converted gardener’s cottage and garden behind a big house and grounds. So as kids, myself and my brothers were always sent outdoors, where we climbed trees and explored hidden corners. I always retained that enjoyment of being outdoors. We were also members of the Dublin Naturalists’ Field Club and would go on outings exploring the habitats, flora and fauna of County Dublin.

LM: That sounds like the ideal childhood for a future BSBI President! How about indoors, at school and later at university?

Micheline in a tree after canoeing on Lough Derg
Image: N. Scott

MSS: Yes, I enjoyed science in school and studied Natural Science in Trinity College Dublin (TCD), where I was lucky to be able to study Geography/ Geology, as well as Botany and Zoology. In the final years, Botany seemed to offer the more interesting courses, so I chose that as my main subject. My fourth-year project was on the contribution of the lichen Peltigera polydactyla to sand dune nitrogen budgets on N Bull Island, Dublin Bay.

In my final year, I became interested in studying in France, since my mother was French. I won a bursary and spent a year in Montpellier studying plant ecology and living for a while in the Camargue, working on lagoonal flora alongside the flamingos. With friends, I explored the countryside around Montpellier and learned the local flora -and birdlife. At some point, I realised I wanted to do more for conservation and that I probably needed a PhD for that. So, I returned to TCD to take up my last years as a TCD Scholar and continued my interest in coastal systems with the study of nitrogen budgets in salt marsh plants, publishing several papers and enjoying giving talks at conferences.

LM: Ok so that’s you back in Ireland, studying and you mentioned the legendary Dublin Naturalists’ Field Club earlier – so did you get involved with them again?

Screenshot of a
Dublin Naturalists' Field Club
walkabout, inner north Dublin, 1981:
as reported in the Irish Times 
MSS: Yes, when I returned from Montpellier in autumn 1977, I met up with some Field Club members who encouraged me to join their committee, which I did. Not long after, while planning future field excursions, we realised that the on-going petrol crisis could seriously affect our ability to travel outside the city. Maura Scannell, Head of the National Herbarium at Glasnevin, suggested we work on the flora of inner Dublin. This caught our imagination and a small group came together, dividing the inner city, conveniently bounded by its two canals, into 14 districts overseen by a range of botanists, notably Jonathan Shackleton, a classmate of mine in TCD and later one-time County Recorder for Cavan; Peter Wyse Jackson, now President of the Missouri Botanical Garden; John Parnell, TCD lecturer in plant taxonomy; and contributions from Maura Scannell, Paddy Reilly, Declan Doogue, John Akeroyd and many more. It was great fun and eventually Peter and I put all the data together and the Flora of Inner Dublin was published in 1984. I’ve never lost my interest in ruderals and wasteland since those heady days when the latter were a blight on Dublin’s streetscape for all but us keen botanists.

Micheline plant recording in
Connemara National Park,
September 2016
LM: Ah that explains why you are always so great at flying the flag for urban botany and the so-called weeds that turn up on our city streets! So, you were out with the Field Club members, publishing the Flora, still working towards your PhD… were you also job-hunting?

MSS: As postgrads, we regularly scoured the pages of the New Scientist for jobs and, having travelled throughout Europe on interrail, I was keen to explore even wider, applying for jobs inter alia in Wales, Mauritania and Zambia, as well as in Ireland. Incredibly, in 1980, I landed a lectureship in plant ecology in the Botany Department of then-named University College Galway (UCG). Luckily, academia was less pressurised then and I spent two summers analysing my data and writing up my PhD, awarded in early 1983. The next week I was taking my colleague Michael O’Connell’s palaeoecology and bryology courses as well as mine, while he took a year’s sabbatical! On his return, I promptly handed him my lecture notes and took up my side of the exchange, choosing to go to Indonesia for a year. I was very lucky to be able to do this, as neither of us had to raise funds for our respective sabbaticals.

Having attended famous French tropical botanist Francis Hallé’s lectures in Montpellier, I was bitten by the bug to see tropical rainforest first-hand. Based in the SE Asian Regional Centre for Tropical Biology in Bogor, Java, I chose to work on the programme to find sustainable ways of using the rattan Calamus manan, prized for its high-quality cane for furniture. This took me with the team to Kalimantan in Borneo and to Sumatra, learning even then of the tragic destruction of the rainforest by timber loggers. Tropical rainforest is an incredibly rich, fascinating and valuable habitat. The clearing out of the rattan vine by local villagers was but a small part of that destruction. On returning to Ireland in 1985, I vowed to raise awareness as best I could about our role in the west in using unsustainable tropical timbers. Sadly now, the ubiquitous palm oil is playing equal havoc, with seas of oil palms replacing the diverse canopies of the rainforest. 

LM: It certainly is. For any readers who aren’t up to speed with how palm oil is contributing to deforestation, this page on the World Wildlife Fund website will be very useful. 

Micheline, you’ve had such a fascinating life in botany and conservation, and travelled so widely! Here we are still in 1985, you’re back in Ireland, a passionate conservationist and there’s a huge but ultimately successful struggle ahead of you – one so important that you recently published a book all about it! Let’s pause here and pick up on the next instalment in a few days – watch this space, readers!

Monday 1 January 2024

New Year Plant Hunt 2024: Day Three

Hello plant hunters, James Harding-Morris here, BSBI Countries Support Manager, taking over from Louise who's been out leading a group hunt in her vice-county today. Here's the list of 36 species they found in bloom.

My impression of day three is that we’ve generally had better weather than on Days One and Two. Certainly, Sarah Watts was greeted by flowering Gorse, blue skies and a rainbow at the head of Loch Tay on her New Year Plant Hunt (image on right). 

Here in Lincolnshire I had blue skies (with a cold wind) as I explored the banks of the Humber estuary. If you saw my post about Ox-eye Daisies from a few weeks ago then I can confirm that they were still in flower today (if looking a little worse for wear).

It just goes to show that going for a recce ahead of your Hunt can pay dividends. Oisín had a quick look today and spotted six species in flower ahead of their walk tomorrow, and Stuart found four – all of which were non-native naturalised shrubs. Does this tell us something interesting about the types of plants seen in flower at this time of year?

It’s been great to see brand new botanists taking part in the Hunt. Lucy Jones took part for the first time (image on left) and found a great spread of New Year Plant Hunt favourites, plus an early Daffodil.

Podling also took part for the first time and recorded a whopping 19 species including, from what I can see on this beautiful photo collage, several species that I didn’t manage to find today!

Speaking of firsts, our CEO Julia Hanmer took part in her first group hunt, organised by the Gloucestershire Natural History Society. They found an astounding 42 species in flower which must say something about the value of a lot of keen eyes. Image on right taken by Julia.

Some solo Hunts racked up big numbers. Alex Prendergast found 34 species flowering in Norfolk, including a currently unnamed elm taxon. Jon Holt reached 40 species around Bicester which feature a very showy Musk Mallow. Steve Coates got to the heady heights of 52 species in Kent, including the marvellous Toothed Medick. However, in terms of pace, perhaps Mandy Forde’s 28 species in 20 minutes by Bangor Pier is a record count?

I always enjoy hearing about the oddities still in flower. I wouldn’t have expected Harebell to be hanging on in London, or Fine-leaved Sandwort in Cambridge. However, I’m always the most impressed (and a little envious!) when someone manages to find something on their New Year Plant Hunt that I’ve never seen, like Sarah Lambert’s Crimson Flax in Peterborough. Beautiful! Image on left.

As I’m writing this – around 8.30pm on the 1st January – the number of lists we’ve had submitted has skyrocketed to over 1400 and the number of species seen in flower has shot-up to 579. We look to be on track for our biggest New Year Plant Hunt ever, so if you haven’t taken part yet, or submitted your records yet, please do! Info and links here in case you need them.

All the best to anyone out hunting tomorrow on our final day.

Sunday 31 December 2023

New Year Plant Hunt 2024: Day Two

The second day of the New Year Plant Hunt dawned and it was still miserable weather for many of us. But there were group hunts planned in many locations; a glance at the Results board this morning showed that only c300 species had been recorded on Day One, so there was obviously more to find; and botanists are a hardy bunch so.... a-hunting we went!

Botanising with friends and family, or in organised groups, is always a real theme of the Hunt and today was no exception. Michael Jones' 8-month old daughter was wrapped up warmly and (judging by the image on right taken by Michael) seems to have really enjoyed using our spotter sheet of Top 20 plants to check what to look for during the Hunt! The spotter sheets were new this year and first-time plant hunters of all ages have found them very useful.

On the Results page, where you'll find the list of most frequently recorded plants (the ones we used when compiling the spotter sheets), a new feature for this year is that our IT wizard Tom Humphrey has put little arrows in to show whether a species is being recorded in bloom more or less frequently than last year. So it looks as though Hazel, Winter Heliotrope and White Dead-nettle are going 'up the charts' but Red Dead-nettle, Shepherd's-purse and Hogweed are going down. Is that what you're finding in your area? Daisy retains it's supreme position as number one on the list. 

So who else was out hunting with friends and family? In Co. Cork, the Glengarriff team notched up 35 species in bloom, more than the Sligo team yesterday - but Sligo botanists had a rainbow for compensation! The Cornish botanists had a great day out in Mevagissey today and found 76 species in bloom. Their list is here, at the top of the list of longest lists (for now!) Fewer species to be found up in in Newcastle, where James Common was out again - it's only Day Two but he was on his third Hunt, this time with partner Matt and they found musk mallow blooming by a bus stop (image on left). Urban and suburban habitats like this often yield the most interesting plant finds.   

Community is an important part of botanising - to enjoy great company and also for sharing ID tips. In Hertfordshire, the Grow Community - Sopwell team (image on right) enjoyed botanising together on their group hunt. There are still quite a few group hunts scheduled for the next two days so do check them out if you'd like some company on your hunt.  

But many of us also enjoy a solo Hunt - a bit of quiet time to recharge our batteries. In Lancashire, Rose Edmondson did her first ever New Year Plant Hunt, inspired by Leif Bersweden's book and armed with the Top 20 spotter sheet

Neil Forbes was out in Arnside and found Spring Sandwort (image below left). With a handlens, he could see anthers sticking out so that counted as 'flowering' and was therefore eligible for the Hunt. Neil also noticed the impact of both microclimate and proximity to the coast on the abundance and status (native or non-native) of the species blooming in the various locations he visited. 

Southern locations tend to have more species in bloom - for example, Kate Gold found 31 species in bloom in East Sussex yesterday, following the same route she's been going since 2016 - whereas further north today, Margaret Cahill in Offaly and Joanie McNaughton in Edinburgh both found slimmer pickings. 

But understanding more about which wild and naturalised plants manage to bloom where, and how this correlates with autumn and winter weather patterns, is what makes the New Year Plant Hunt so interesting. So well done to those northern plant hunters who braved the cold and went out to see what they could find in bloom. 

By 10pm, when we had just about reached the halfway point of this year's Hunt, the Results board showed that plant hunters had uploaded details of more than 700 surveys and the total number of species recorded in bloom had risen to 439. Great work everyone!

What will tomorrow bring? I'm leading a hunt around a Leicester industrial estate in the afternoon and look forward to seeing how our count compares with previous years at the same location. My colleague James Harding-Morris, the mastermind behind those great spotter sheets, will be here in the evening to summarise Day Three findings for you. 

Happy hunting and fingers crossed for decent weather!

Saturday 30 December 2023

New Year Plant Hunt 2024: Day One


Our thirteenth New Year Plant Hunt kicked off today and at just a few minutes past midnight, the first record pinged in: the inimitable Ger Scollard recorded Ivy-leaved Toadflax in southwest Ireland by flashlight and that became the first record to light up our interactive results map

Last year Ger did the same thing but with Red Dead-nettle. There's no stopping this man! 

Most other people waited until the sun was up and then the records started to flood in, despite wet and windy weather in many places. 

James Common led fellow Tyneside botanists on two Hunts, one in "soggy" Tynemouth (image above right) and one in Heaton where, he tells us, it rained again. But James was undaunted and at least he didn't have to endure the heavy snow which prevented Sarah Watts from going out hunting! 

Charlotte Rankin also braved unpleasant weather in Carlisle to notch up 20 species including Narrow-leaved Ragwort (image on left) which, as Plant Atlas 2020 tells us, is a naturalised South African species which is spreading rapidly, especially in England and in the Dublin area. 

This is the first New Year Plant Hunt since the publication of Plant Atlas 2020 so plant hunters have been able to access up-to-date information about the plants they are seeing and any trends driving changes in distribution, e.g. climate change, habitat loss etc. 

Plant Atlas 2020 is such a great resource and so are the summary reports for Britain and for Ireland

The weather didn't look too bad for Tim Rich who, with Sarah Whild, carried out the very first New Year Plant Hunt over a decade ago. 

Little did they know that their 'hmm I wonder what we'll find in bloom around here at New Year' would turn into a citizen science activity that attracts thousands of people across Britain and Ireland! 

This year Tim, one of Britain's top botanists, was out hunting in Cardiff with Julian Woodman, one of the
East Glamorgan County Recorders. They notched up 54 species between them, including Bulbous Buttercup (image on right) and you can see their list here

As the day went on, records pinged in from locations across Britain and Ireland. In Chandler's Ford in Hampshire, Tristan Norton, Martin Rand & co found Jersey Cudweed (image on left showing it in characteristic habitat between paving stones). Jersey Cudweed is another species that Plant Atlas 2020 suggests is spreading northwards, perhaps due to climate change.
 
On the Kintyre peninsula there were five species in bloom, including Herb-Robert which, surprisingly, proved elusive further south, while in Castlegregory in County Kerry, Olly Lynch and Hannah Mulcahy found 24 species in bloom, including a rather nice Valerianella corn-salad (image below right). 

The habitats that our intrepid plant hunters visited in their search for wildflowers ranged from a wall in Northamptonshire, where Brian Laney, Alyson Freeman and their team found Annual Mercury, to a drainpipe in Uckfield, Sussex, where Plant Hunt regular Wendy Tagg spotted Yellow Corydalis in bloom, to school grounds in Worcestershire, where the fabulous BHA Potting Sheds team recorded 21 species in bloom including the lovely but diminutive whitlow-grass (image below left). 

Those tiny white members of the Cabbage family can be tricky to ID but fortunately there is an excellent cribsheet by the amazing Moira (aka Nature Lark) to help you - it's free to download here

Of course some of the longest lists came from southern and coastal areas: 67 species in Alderney, 64 species spotted by Jo and her team in Cromer. Jo had no sooner got back from her Cromer Hunt than she was on the Support Desk and on social media (Twitter and Bluesky) helping with plant ID - there's dedication for you! 

But as ecologist Joni Cook, volunteering on the Support Desk for the first time this year, quite rightly pointed out, the New Year Plant Hunt isn't just about longest lists: we are also keen to hear if you hunted but found absolutely nothing. 

It all helps us build up a clearer picture of how wild and naturalised plants across Britain and Ireland are responding to a changing climate. 

So, on to Day Two of the Hunt - we can't wait to hear how you get on and the Support Team is ready to help if you run into any problems! Goodnight, we'll leave you with this lovely little whitlow-grass.

Thursday 28 December 2023

British & Irish Botany: issue 5.3 published

Ian browsing a copy of 'Stace'
Image: L. Marsh
It's been six months since we published the last issue of British & Irish Botany, the Botanical Society's online, Open Access scientific journal. We are about to press publish on another issue and this one marks a milestone in the journal's history: this will be the final issue under the editorship of Ian Denholm.

Ian took over the editorship of British & Irish Botany's predecessor, New Journal of Botany, in 2015, just weeks after his term as BSBI President ended; he oversaw the setting up of British & Irish Botany and has been at the helm for the last five years. So this really is the end of an era! 

Don't worry about the future of the journal - Ian has overseen the succession plans and we'll be announcing the new Editor-in-Chief very soon - but for now, I'd like to hand over to Ian to tell you about what's in this latest issue of British & Irish Botany:

"Publication of Issue 5(3) of British & Irish Botany (B&IB) completes the fifth year of the Botanical Society of Britain & Ireland's online scientific journal. Over this period there have been 18 issues containing 136 papers covering the taxonomy, history, origins, ecology and conservation of the British and Irish flora. The appearance of each issue has traditionally been accompanied by a blogpost from Louise Marsh summarising the contents and highlighting findings of particular significance. On this occasion, in light of my retirement as editor-in-chief, she has graciously stepped aside and delegated this task to me!

Hieracium elizabethae-reginae
Image: T. Rich
"We commence with a paper from Tim Rich, one of B&IB’s most prolific contributors, who with co-author James Warren adds a new endemic species of hawkweed (Hieracium) to the British flora. The significance of this development is heightened by the taxon being named in honour of our late Queen Elizabeth II. Careful reading of the paper will disclose the connection! Anyone who was an active botanist in the ‘pre-Stace’ era will no doubt retain great affection for the preceding Flora of the British Isles by Clapham, Tutin and Warburg (CTW). A paper by David Wilkinson and Laura Jean Cameron centres on a lunch held to launch the first edition of CTW in 1952. They speculate on the identity of the person caricatured on the cover of the lunch menu, and provide a fascinating image of the menu itself signed by most of the botanical illuminati of the day.

"Ridha El Mokni and Duilio Iamonico explore aspects of nomenclature within the genus Gypsophila which, although not native to Britain and Ireland, contains several species that have been reported as garden escapes or casuals from other sources, and may become more frequent under changing climatic conditions. Frank Horsman investigates in detail the contributions of the 17th century botanist Edward Morgan, to knowledge of the Welsh flora in particular. Morgan emerges from this account as something of an unsung hero whose work and influence on contemporaries deserves much more recognition and respect than it is presently accorded.

Artemisia campestris subsp. maritima
Image: J. Twibell


"The theme of Welsh plants extends through the remaining two papers in the issue. Field Wormwood (Artemisia campestris) is a rare, iconic and native component of the Breckland flora, but also grows as a distinct subspecies (maritima) on the Sefton coast in Lancashire and at Crymlin Burrows in South Wales. Andy Jones and Fred Rumsey review evidence from various sources that collectively tip the balance in favour of maritima plants being recent arrivals on our shores, in direct contrast to their Breckland counterparts. 

"Fred Rumsey (again!) and Chris Thorogood (authors of the BSBI Broomrapes Handbook) detail the history, distribution and ecology of Picris Broomrape, Orobanche picridis. This has proved a challenging taxon due to nomenclatural confusion and morphological similarity to Common Broomrape, Orobanche minor. Most botanists to date (including me) have sought it on chalk in east Kent and on the Isle of Wight. While confirming its continued presence at these locations, the authors also report the discovery of a huge newly-discovered (and presumably previously overlooked) colony on private land in South Wales.

Orobanche picridis
Images: C. Thorogood
& F. Rumsey

"Editing the journal for five years has been a fair commitment of time, but also rewarding in that I have learned a great deal from the contents of papers and have enjoyed stimulating and productive interactions with authors. I thank Louise Marsh for exceptional editorial assistance, Jonathan Shanklin for meticulous proof-reading, and all who have supported the journal by reviewing manuscripts and contributing papers. May British & Irish Botany continue to thrive under new management!"

Huge thanks to Ian for all he has done to establish British & Irish Botany - it has been a delight to assist him! 

I hope he will enjoy having more time for all his other botanical interests, including being BSBI's joint County Recorder for Hertfordshire, BSBI's joint referee for orchids, sitting on BSBI's Science & Data Committee.... he's not so much retiring as re-calibrating! 

So it just remains for me to point you to the latest issue of British & Irish Botany and say "watch this space" for news about Ian's handover to his successor.  

Sunday 1 October 2023

BSBI membership: save money with our autumn 2024 special offer

Last autumn, we launched our membership special offer by saying that 'in a rapidly changing world, our wild plants have never been more in need of the support, understanding and appreciation that BSBI is uniquely placed to provide'. In the 12 months since then, we've seen even more evidence of how our climate is changing, while Plant Atlas 2020 and the latest State of Nature report flagged how British and Irish wild flowers, and the many other species of wildlife who depend on them, are increasingly threatened. 

We have never been more reliant on, and grateful for, the contributions of BSBI's fabulous volunteer members. So today we are inviting you to join our growing ranks, if you haven't already, and asking our members to help us spread the word about the benefits of BSBI membership - for you and for our wonderful wild flowers. 

So, at a time when we are all counting the pennies, why join BSBI? And why now?

Green-winged orchid in East Sussex
Image: Susan Greig

First of all, if you join BSBI in October, your membership starts at once so you could enjoy up to 15 months of membership benefits for the price of 12 months. You wouldn't need to renew your membership until January 2025.

Secondly, we've expanded our range of membership benefits in the past year and there are even more in the pipeline. As well as the three issues each year of BSBI News, our colourful magazine packed with information about British and Irish wild flowers (check out the sampler page and some of the free articles to give you an idea of the contents), membership brings you big discounts on botany books, such as Plant Atlas 2020 (50% off for members buying the print copy); BSBI Handbooks (pre-publication offers for members, usually around a third off) and other selected botany books advertised via the password-protected members' area on our website. 

Limestone bedstraw on The Burren
Image: Heather Kelly
Membership also gives you favoured status when applying for BSBI training and plant study grants - if you're thinking of doing a plant ID course, such as BSBI's online Identiplant course or one of the many courses offered by external providers, you can apply for a grant of up to £250 to help you. Members also have exclusive access to 100+ expert plant referees to help you with identification, and to 100+ scientific papers free to download from our members' area. Concerned about the environmental impact of your membership? By opting for paperless membership and choosing eBooks rather than printed Handbooks, you'll be minimising your carbon footprint. 

Wood-sorrel in Surrey
Image: Gillian Elsom
But there's a third reason for joining the growing ranks of BSBI members - it's not just about all the practical and financial benefits you'll enjoy. You'll also be helping us to support British and Irish wildflowers. How? Because while many of our almost 4,000 members carry out amazing work studying, recording, monitoring and helping to conserve wild plants across Britain and Ireland, feeding into projects such as Plant Atlas 2020, the State of Nature 2023 report, the many county Floras and the National Plant Monitoring Scheme in which BSBI is a partner, many others are simply happy to know that their subscription helps support our work to advance the understanding and appreciation of wild plants and to support their conservation across Britain and Ireland. 

Autumn colours by Lough Dan, Co. Wicklow
Image: Alexis Fitzgerald
Check out our nature conservation policy and our strategic plan to find out more; find out how our botanical heatmaps, developed with Natural England, are helping ensure that we get the right tree in the right place (and not in the wrong place!); check out the members who won awards in 2022 for outstanding contributions to botany; or leaf through our latest Annual Review to find out what the Society achieved last year thanks to all our wonderful members.

If you are already a BSBI member, we'd like to say a huge thank you to each and every one of you for all that you do, and ask you to spread the word to friends and colleagues who you think might enjoy becoming a member - and don't forget that a gift membership of BSBI makes a great present for a loved one!

Our ranks are growing - by around 30% in the last three years - so if you haven't yet joined us, why not head over here and become our next new member? We can't wait to welcome you and send you your membership welcome pack. Together we can keep working towards a world where wild plants across Britain and Ireland thrive and are valued - and so are the thousands of amazing BSBI botanists who support them.

Friday 28 July 2023

Resources for horticulturally-inclined botanists

Tree Lupin naturalised near St. Andrews, Scotland
Image: P. Marks
Many botanists are as interested in horticultural plants as they are in 'wild' plants, whether because they are keen gardeners or because, as our climate changes, an increasing number of garden plants are naturalising and managing to persist in the wild without human intervention. 

This was one of the many fascinating discoveries revealed by BSBI's Plant Atlas 2020 project - more than 50% of the taxa recorded were of non-native species

Many of these are ancient introductions (archaeophytes), often brought over by the Romans, or neophytes, introduced by humans either deliberately or accidentally in the past five centuries. 

Red-hot Poker blooming in Kent
at New Year  2018
Image: D. Steere
Our 'Definitions' page explains a bit more about these terms. 

But increasingly we are noticing garden plants which used to die back in the autumn but are now 'jumping the garden fence' and becoming naturalised between pavement cracks, at the bases of walls, on waste ground... some are even managing to flower in midwinter

Red-hot Poker Kniphofia uvaria, Three-cornered Garlic Allium triquetrum and Fern-leaved Beggarticks Bidens ferulifolia have all been recorded in bloom during recent New Year Plant Hunts.  

Our in-house expert referee on garden plants (accessible only to BSBI members) has never been busier, dealing with ID queries, and of course there are gardening books and websites, but now there is another option available to botanists wanting to take a deeper dive into the identification and understanding of garden plants. 

Books in the Lindley Library
Image courtesy of the RHS

The Royal Horticultural Society's Lindley Library in London holds world-renowned collections of books on horticulture, early printed books and botanical art. 

Their modern collections are available for everyone to access but BSBI members interested in the botanical collection are now invited to sign up as researchers (this is free) and gain access to the RHS reference collection, rare books and the botanical art. 

Groups of botanists can also request a tour of the collection (free but donations invited). That's two great ways to find out more about garden plants. Just email library@rhs.org.uk to arrange your visit.

Early printed botanical book
 in the Lindley Library

Image courtesy of the RHS

Some of the upcoming RHS events may also be of interest to botanists. Dr Mark Spencer, BSBI County Recorder for Middlesex/ the London area, is giving a talk on 3rd August about his book Murder Most Florid: inside the mind of a forensic botanist. This is a longer version of the fascinating talk he gave at BSBI's British & Irish Botanical Conference, held last November at the Natural History Museum. 

On 8th August, Sarah Morrish (who exhibited at BSBI's 2017 Annual Exhibition Meeting, the forerunner of the British & Irish Botanical Conference) will be leading a workshop on 'Illustrating Nature: Introduction to Botanical Art in Pen & Ink'. 

Find out more about these events and book your space via this link