What do WFS members do?

Basically, we enjoy looking for and learning to identify plants in the wild in Britain. Many of our members are also excellent photographers and field meetings often provide an opportunity to learn about this as well as conservation. Please note that as a Society we do not usually provide advice about cultivating wild flowers in gardens - this is more of a horticultural bias that we believe other organisations are better able to service. Please refer to our "Links" page if your interests lie in this direction.

On first joining the Society, you are allocated to a Branch on a geographical basis. Each Branch has a Secretary who will help you with the identification of wild flowers.

The Society publishes a variety of articles and other features about wild flowers in the Wild Flower Magazine, which appears three times a year.

Unique to the Society is the Wild Flower record book. It lists the names of 1,000 of the plants most likely to be recognised by amateurs in the British Isles. In it you can record the place, the date and the habitat of any plant found. If you want to, you can use the record book as an entry for an annual competition to record the highest number of plants in your Branch.

You send your record book to your Branch Secretary for checking before the end of the year. Recording a certain number of plants in a year qualifies a member for optional "promotion" to a national branch in which recording is cumulative.

Other competitions include:

• the First Hunt, for plants in flower during the first week of March
• the Last Hunt, for plants in flower on the last day of October
• the Last Week Hunt, for plants in flower during the last seven days of October, and
• the Winter Months Hunt for plants in flower during December, January and February

There are also annual photographic competitions, for both novices and experienced photographers. These can be colour slides or prints (including digital), with a cup awarded to the best entry of each kind.

The Society awards the Dent Prize, which is a sum of money to be spent on botanical books, awarded to the most promising junior member.

The photographic competition entries are exhibited at the Society's Annual General Meeting, which is held in November and is followed by a Tea Party. The AGM is held in London and other cities around England every other year. This is an opportunity for members to meet each other, to exchange information about their finds, buy botanical books, and so on.

Members also meet each other at national, one or two-day, field meetings and at local branch meetings. These are announced in the Magazine, together with notices and reports of field meetings, Branch and competition Secretaries' reports, and in the Members section under Meetings on the Home Page.

Membership traditionally includes all, from the youngest junior, to some very distinguished botanists, past and present, in Britain and abroad.

Click here for some members' testimonials