Sunny garden

Among the yellow rattle is a single bulbous buttercup. Even though it is common according to my book, I haven’t knowingly noticed one before. Its defining feature is downward pointing sepals but the leaves also look different from those of creeping buttercup, which tend to be mottled and not softly downy like these. At soil level, the stem…

Docks

I’ve been trying to tell apart the different docks and it is getting easier as the fruits develop. Four species are common around here. Broad-leaved dock is the most familiar and probably the one you reach for to neutralise nettle stings. Note the frilly ‘tepals’ around the fruit or ‘wart’. Curled dock has distinctly curled…

Weeds

In the garden, a tiny specimen of common ramping fumitory, some lady’s smock and yellow rattle that we planted to kick-start a wild flower patch by parasitising the lawn. There are five species of speedwell: germander, wall, thyme-leaved, ivy-leaved, and slender speedwell. Other flowers thrive through lack of weeding rather than by design. Common cow-wheat in woods in South Brent