Search

Musk mallow has pretty pink flowers that can be seen along roadside verges, hedgerows and field margins in summer. It lives up to its name, producing a delicate, musky smell that increases indoors.

With its familiar features, the Field pansy is a delicate version of a garden favourite. Usually creamy-yellow in colour, it can be seen in fields and on roadside verges and waste ground.

The carnivorous lifestyle of the round-leaved sundew makes this heathland plant a fascinating species. The round leaves have sticky, 'dew'-covered tendrils that tempt in unsuspecting insects as prey.

Hedge mustard is a tall plant with small, yellow flowers atop tough stems. It likes disturbed ground and grows in hedgerows and roadside verges, and on waste ground.

Favouring shady spots in woodlands and hedgerows, Garlic mustard can grow very tall. It has small, white flowers and, as its name suggests, smells faintly of garlic.

Water-cress has become so popular as a salad addition that it is now cultivated on a wide scale. In the wild, it grows in shallow, fast-flowing streams and is an indicator of clean water.

The stinging nettle is a familiar and common plant, often firmly rooted in our memories after our first, hands-on experience - a prickling irritation that's not forgotten easily!

Pellitory-of-the-wall is a small to medium-sized herb that frequently grows from cracks in old stone walls, pavements, cliffs and banks, and churches and ruins.

Fat hen is a persistent 'weed' of fields and gardens, verges and hedgerows. But, like many of our weed species, it is a good food source for birds and insects.

Sometimes called 'Wild spinach', Sea beet can be cooked and eaten. It grows wild on shingle beaches, cliffs and bare ground near to the sea, as well as in saltmarshes.

Sometimes called 'Marsh samphire', wild common glasswort is often gathered and eaten. It grows on saltmarshes and beaches, sometimes forming big, green, fleshy carpets.

Bladder campion is so-called for the bladder-like bulge that sites just behind the five-petalled flower - this is actually the fused sepals. Look for it on grasslands, farmland and along hedgerows.