Your best find of the season

[the young hunter]

My best finds:

Man orchid - northamptonshire
Pasque flower - northamptonshire
Small White orchid - cumbria (little asby interestingly jhewitt15!)
Lady's-slipper orchid - silverdale
Red helleborine - bucks.
Violet helleborine (95!) and var. rosea - bucks.
Narrow-lipped helleborine var. neglecta - bucks.
Dune Helleborine - sandscale hawes
Green-flowered helleborine - sandscale hawes
Irish Lady's-tresses - colonsay (by far my best find!)
Greater Butterfly orchid (my new local ones) - wenlock edge
Loose-flowered orchid - bulgaria
Ophrys cornuta (en masse) - bulgaria
Lesser butterfly orchid (45) - bulgaria
Himantoglossum caprinum ('balkan lizard orchid' in bud) - bulgaria
Orchid tridentata ('toothed orchid') - bulgaria
Creeping Lady's-tresses - cumbria




mike

[Jim Ford]

A pound coin in the local Tesco's car park.
;^)

Jim

[leifus]

Originally Posted by jim Ford

a Pound Coin In The Local Tesco's Car Park.
;^)

Jim

haha

[leifus]

Originally Posted by the young hunter

My best finds:

Man orchid - northamptonshire
Pasque flower - northamptonshire
Small White orchid - cumbria (little asby interestingly jhewitt15!)
Lady's-slipper orchid - silverdale
Red helleborine - bucks.
Violet helleborine (95!) and var. rosea - bucks.
Narrow-lipped helleborine var. neglecta - bucks.
Dune Helleborine - sandscale hawes
Green-flowered helleborine - sandscale hawes
Irish Lady's-tresses - colonsay (by far my best find!)
Greater Butterfly orchid (my new local ones) - wenlock edge
Loose-flowered orchid - bulgaria
Ophrys cornuta (en masse) - bulgaria
Lesser butterfly orchid (45) - bulgaria
Himantoglossum caprinum ('balkan lizard orchid' in bud) - bulgaria
Orchid tridentata ('toothed orchid') - bulgaria
Creeping Lady's-tresses - cumbria




mike

Yeah yeah no need to show off!

I've only ever seen 2 of those!! - how bad is that?!?!

[the young hunter]

haha, sorry

Can't help myself If your keen, you'll see all of them, trust me

Jim, you are one funny man!


mike

[leifus]

Originally Posted by the young hunter

haha, sorry

Can't help myself If your keen, you'll see all of them, trust me

Jim, you are one funny man!


mike

I'm more than keen but its the question of whether my mum will take me 350 miles to get a photo of something small and dull-coloured

[KeenTeen17]

Originally Posted by leifus

I'm more than keen but its the question of whether my mum will take me 350 miles to get a photo of something small and dull-coloured

I've only seen 7 of those - but this is my first year's botanising so 400+ species is pretty good!

Leif has got a point. I find it hard to get my parents to drive me 5 miles up the road - let alone 350! Thank God I have a friend in the local nature club who does all that for me! not 350 miles though - about 50.

[leifus]

Originally Posted by KeenTeen17

I've only seen 7 of those - but this is my first year's botanising so 400+ species is pretty good!

Leif has got a point. I find it hard to get my parents to drive me 5 miles up the road - let alone 350! Thank God I have a friend in the local nature club who does all that for me! not 350 miles though - about 50.

I'm on 450 this year and will be on 451 tomorrow when I go to see red hemp nettle (seen that keenteen? )

[KeenTeen17]

no - but I will do someday . seen the large flowered hemp nettle?

[leifus]

Originally Posted by KeenTeen17

no - but I will do someday . seen the large flowered hemp nettle?

no but I would looooove to!! Lucky you i guess

[the young hunter]

Grows like a weed in Bulgaria




mike

[Lizard1]

My apologies for making this point again. I fully intend to go back to sleep after this post.

Is it really necessary to list the location of Britain’s most illustrious orchid (LSO)? I know for a fact that the Committee in charge of the conservation of this species has gone out of its way to keep the location of the remaining wild plant off the internet. This has in the past involved using the police wildlife crime unit on a particular poster to a particular website (who gave no further info than that provided here). And yet it still continues.

I know that the location of the plant has had much wider public knowledge in the last 5-10 years but do you want to be the individual who upsets the conservation of this species? Perhaps spare a thought for the people who devote many hours to protect the species and have been involved in its recovery across northern England.

This is a free country and if you want to continue to provide information on rare orchid locations openly on the internet then I wont be stopping you. But before posting why not ask yourself a couple of questions. Will I potentially be harming the species or habitat in which it grows if I list this information? Will I be compromising a conservation strategy in place by the land owners, site managers, conservationists etc that may be relying on anonymity as a degree of protection (and who may not have the resources to cope with a sudden surge of visitors, or the relations with a landowner who does not want to see a sudden surge of visitors)?.

In the last couple of weeks on here we seem to go from one end of the spectrum to the other. On the one hand not mentioning an orchid site in Buckinghamshire that has enjoyed (despite this years events) a successful policy of open access and publication of the rare species that occur there; to on the other openly naming the location of the last LSO !

Finally, the original poster could ofcourse take this as an open attack on them. You could write a lengthy reply detailing why you think its good to put forward the information, or what little harm it does. I know all the pros and cons of both sides of the argument, and this is not a personal attack, just a thought provoking exercise. I dont wish to sound patronising, just flag up my conclusions having been in such situations myself before. You are quite free to make up your own conclusions. Happy orchid/wildflower hunting to all.



To the original poster: a further apology for hijacking this thread. To answer your question. Unfortunately I haven’t done much botonising this year. I would say that find does not include something you go and look for because you know its there and are following a map and six figure ref! To me, Jenny’s Frog Orchid find was a good example of a proper find. My best for the year has to be Small Flowered Buttercup or Corn Gromwell at a new local site. I too have found quite a few Lesser Snapdragon this year.

Thanks

[Jim Ford]

So, was I out of order for my pound coin in Tesco's car park?
;^)

Jim

[Jim Ford]

I'm sorry, looking at it now I shouldn't have made the above posting. Lizard1 was making a serious point.

Jim

[the young hunter]

I agree with Lizard1 (I know my track record hasn't been great on this site!).

In regard to the LSOs,
I see no problem mentioning the Lancashire site as this is all over the internet and 1000's of people visit every year.
Of course, mentioning the Yorkshire site is a serious threat to the security of the orginal plant so this is a definite no no.

However, the Yorkshire site is given on Wikipedia so maybe it is them who should be thinking about their priorities. Publisising such an important site on the internet is worrying to say the least and to do it on the most well known online encyclopedia is terrible.


mike

[leifus]

Originally Posted by the young hunter

I agree with Lizard1 (I know my track record hasn't been great on this site!).

In regard to the LSOs,
I see no problem mentioning the Lancashire site as this is all over the internet and 1000's of people visit every year.
Of course, mentioning the Yorkshire site is a serious threat to the security of the orginal plant so this is a definite no no.

However, the Yorkshire site is given on Wikipedia so maybe it is them who should be thinking about their priorities. Publisising such an important site on the internet is worrying to say the least and to do it on the most well known online encyclopedia is terrible.


mike

maybe that should be " the Yorkshire site is given on a certain website I visited"

[davidbr]

As someone who's only engaged in semi-serious plant-hunting since the start of June, in a largely urban area (a 40-odd mile radius of Bristol), most of what I'd consider "star finds" have been non-natives. I'd always been a birder mainly, with a secondary interest in botany, but finding my mobility restricted following surgery this year I'd set out to find & photograph as many British plant species as possible "in the wild" - so far I've managed 772, not too bad seeing as I'd missed the Spring season.

Highlights include two species not on the current (and extremely extensive...) BSBI online database - Hairy Canary Clover (Dorycnium hirsutum) & Hooker's Inula (Inula hookeri), plus Pink Evening-primrose (Oenothera rosea) & Ithuriel's Spear (Trietelia laxa) which don't seem to have any current locations recorded. It goes without saying that I'm indebted to the members of this forum who assisted by suggesting the ID of, I think, most of those - records & pictures will be sent into BSBI, so just maybe I've added something to the UK floral record as well as having had fun

Other than that, I was delighted to manage (after about a dozen visits) to get to grips (and acceptable photos) of the Avon Gorge whitebeam set, Balkan Spurge Euphorbia elongata on a patch of suburban Bristol wasteland was another real surprise & the profusion of Nettle-leaved Bellflowers at the Cheddar Gorge was spectacular if not especially rare (too late for the Cheddar Pinks, though - better luck next year...)

There should be another rush of easy "ticks" once the Spring bulbs get going, then it'll probably get a whole lot trickier

[davidbr]

With regards to the point Lizard1 made re; naming the locations of rarities, it's a battleground that constantly re-surfaces within the birding world whenever a rarity looks like settling down to breed or simply turns up somewhere off the beaten nature reserve track. And, whilst I can see both sides of the argument, I tend to come down firmly on the side of the observers.

I genuinely believe, from experience I've garnered over years in the field, that most people out there in the countryside, be they looking for birds, plants, butterflies or whatever, are there because they have a real love of nature and want to see something interesting/unusual/spectacular. Some, like the oft-hated "twitchers", are competitive bordering on the obsessive, but most of us like to see something different (whether you record it on a list or not) and as you exhaust the common options, you have to travel ever more and to ever-fewer sites to do so.

As a birder my chances of finding, say, a White-crowned Sparrow at large in the UK were lottery-winner sized remote, so when one turned up at Cley in Norfolk last winter I was delighted to find the news made public. Not everyone was; it's a small village with roads ill-designed to take thousands of parking birders, damage was caused (though eventually repaired through on-site donations) and no doubt disturbance increased upon an internationally-important wintering site.

But should that bird have been the priviledge, the property if you like, of a select band of fortunate locals? Did they own that bird? Did they have the right to deny me, and thousands like me, a maybe once-in-a-lifetime chance simply because I wouldn't have been on the local grapevine? Sorry, but I say No, and the same applies to a botanical rarity such as the Lady's-slipper Orchid; why shouldn't a keen botanist from the south-west have the same chance & priviledge of seeing such a spectacular plant, as does a Yorkshireman with the right contacts?

Whole essays can and have been written on this topic and how it relates to the birding scene, but the basics are the same. Whether or not we're lucky enough to have the time, or fitness, to give hands-on help to conservation projects, these projects all depend on the financial support of millions of ordinary people - those who hand over their cheques to the RSPB, Wildlife Trusts or Plantlife, down to those who pay the taxes which kick-start Government support. Don't they have the right to see what they're helping pay for?

Like it or not, the survival of these species depends on greater open-ness, not less. We need people to care whether the Bittern, or Swallowtail, or Lady's-slipper Orchid remain as part of Britain's flora & fauna - and the best way to do that is to show it to them. The former two all have sites publicly available, within a click of a mouse online, where they can be seen by Joe & Jane Public at their leisure. Those sites are managed, income is raised and whilst I'm not saying those visitors have no, or even little, impact, there are far more Bitterns & Swallowtails in this country now as a result of that open-ness.

Most bird conservation groups recognise this; wardens are appointed, car parks set up, donation boxes positioned and 9 times out of 10, when a rarity shows up invitations are openly extended and managed as best as possible. Those fighting to conserve our plants will have to do the same, else I fear they'll be fighting a losing battle.

[Lizard1]

David,

I would generally agree with what you say. However, the point Im making is different. I don’t look after LSO. I do respect the choice that the Committee in charge of its conservation has made. As an individual with absolutely no connection to the land where it is situated or the conservation of the species in the UK, I don’t want to influence (inadvertently or not) the strategy chosen. If I were to release information I would say I cannot predict the consequences or know the effects of my actions, and to be honest there are sometimes exceptions to a general conclusion. Sometimes successful conservation does it seems unfortunately mean privacy. I would respect that, but you are free to make your own choices.

So again I would ask, who are you, or anyone else with absolutely no connection or time in conservation of the species in question, to rush in and (potentially) jeopardize the work being done?

The examples you provide of openness are where a body has made a decision to open the gates and make public the fascinating feature(s) that are present at a particular site. Like you I think that is great, Ive benefited from it no end, and will do so in the future. I do hope that we move in that general direction more, as we no doubt are. This is not the case here with LSO, and Im sure that there have been many debates over whether it should be the case, and these debates will continue.

If you or anyone else feels strongly about a change to a policy of openness in this case I would suggest, out of good practice, that you take it through the Committee in charge of the species conservation rather than striking out alone (like one website I was careful not to give extra advertisment to in my first post).

Ill leave it at that.

Thanks.

ps whether or not you agree with their policy of secrecy for LSO it appears to me that the Committee are doing a great job with the conservation of this species in the UK, and positive steps have been made in the last 15 years, given how tricky a species it is to work with. It would be a shame to see this set back in any way.