2000 Frensham Surrey 20 May One Day Meeting
The three reports of one-day meetings that I have had for this season are interesting in providing insights into very different parts of the country. First, the Surrey heaths in springtime. Noreen and Roy Sherlock took fifteen people to the heath area round Frensham Great Pond on 20 May a fine sunny day. Characteristic plants were Ornithopus perpusillus (Common Bird's Foot), Erodium cicutarium (Common Storks-bill) and Aira praecox (Early Hair Grass) for instance; more unusual were Hypochoeris glabra (Smooth Cat's Ear), Aira caryophyllea (Silver Hair Grass), Teesdalia nudicaulis (Shepherd's Cress), and two normally seaside plants - Carex arenaria (Sand Sedge) and Poa bulbosa (Bulbous Meadow Grass), the latter often proliferating. Later, it was aliens time, as so often in the well-populated Surrey with every chance of naturalising garden throw-outs. The first of these to be encountered was Amelanchier lamarckii (Juneberry) after which, among the most interesting were perhaps Gaultheria mucronata (Prickly Heath), Luzula luzuloides (White Wood-rush) and finally a quantity of Rubus spectabilis (Salmonberry) still with a few flowers. Roy asks me to add that the Spiraea sent to Wisley for determination was S. x. cinerea.
Next, on 28 May, a day on the Kentish chalk in the soaking wet. Susan Pittman, who sent me an account of it, describes how she turned up at the meeting place half expecting cancellation but nearly 20 braved the weather: "Flower Fanatics Face Freak Floods", as Susan put it. Their reward was orchids in abundance - the Lady, Butterfly, White Helleborine, Twayblade, Fly and Common Spotted for a start, to be followed by the Man and the Bird's Nest in a different wood. Later, a flooded road forced the party of cars to turn around and find a safer way to Kemsing Down. There the chalk downland flora was a delight to everyone and an astonishment to those who had come from far away, the brilliant blue of Chalk Milkwort setting off the rest, including more orchids. And, it had stopped raining!
From here to Durham marks a great change. On 9 July Tom Spowart took a party to visit an SSSI in part of a disused magnesian limestone quarry. This is one of the best sites in England for Epipactis atrorubens (Dark Red Helleborine) and Tom says that here they were so thick on the ground that it was difficult to avoid standing on them. (I do believe him but I can't imagine it!) Other orchids were abundant as in Kent, but six weeks later. Here were the Fragrant, Pyramidal, Bee, Northern Marsh, Common Spotted and Common Twayblade. Not only were they abundant; some of them, particularly the Fragrant Orchids were enormous. People were also pleased with another rarity, Botrychium lunaria (Moonwort) growing in an almost soil-less area at the top of the quarry among Thyme, Thymus polytrichus, and Blue Moor Grass, Sesleria caerulea. A riot of colour was provided by Geranium sanguineum (Bloody Cranesbill) Helianthemum nummularium (Rock Rose), Centaurea, Scabious, Rest Harrow etc. Nearly 100 species were recorded in the IVi hours spent in the quarry. In the next quarry visited, though less spectacular, over 80 records were made, including Pinguicula vulgaris (Butterwort) and Carlina vulgaris (Carline Thistle). The final stop of the day was to visit the alien Artemisia verlotiorum (Chinese Mugwort) growing near the normal Mugwort for easy comparison.
The leader reports that, apart from the plants, the party saw large numbers of butterflies and moths including the very local Durham Argus, the attractive Common Blues and the brightly coloured day-flying Burnet Moths. They also saw several of the large Heath Snails which are very uncommon in the north of England and are one of the reasons for the quarries' status. I would like to recommend that other leaders of meetings do, when they can, add details of this kind to their reports: they do fill out and enliven the picture of a botanical day.
ELIZABETH NORMAN