Somerset Rare Plants Group

On 4th July nine members visited Hilcombe Hanging and Beaumont’s Wood near Alfred’s Tower on the eastern edge of Somerset. The report is available here.

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SAHNS is hosting an online talk on Somerset’s coastal wildlife by Nigel Phillips on Saturday 10th July. Click here for details.

You can read here about a damp but successful day out last month, at Adcombe Wood and Woodram Copse in the Blackdowns. Adder’s-tongue, Zigzag Clover, Herb-Paris and Midland Hawthorn were among the highlights.

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Around a dozen members had a memorable day out at one of the most important rocky limestone sites on the Mendip scarp earlier this month. You can read the report here.

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Liz and Helena led small groups visiting the coast around Clevedon on 2nd May. You can read their reports here.

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Our first field meeting of the year was held at Quants SSSI (Blackdown Hills) on 18th April. You can read all about it in Simon’s report on the new meeting reports page.

The latest target species for which we need to update our records is the diminutive Adder’s-tongue fern Ophioglossum vulgatum. You can find a spreadsheet of places to search, compiled by Liz McDonnell, on the Adder’s-tongue page.

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Next month, Cath Shellswell of Plantlife will be participating in an online talk about the fast-declining group of plants characteristic of arable fields. If you are interested, you can book a place via the Field Studies Council website.

Somerset Wildlife Trust and the Diocese of Bath and Wells have started a joint Wilder Churches project to protect biodiversity in churchyards and on other church land. You can read about it on the Somerset Wildlife Trust website. Somerset Botany Group have been asked by the SWT coordinator, Pippa Rayner, to provide help with habitat mapping and plant identification. The diocese covers almost all of historic Somerset, and so the project will include parishes in BANES and North Somerset.

If members of SRPG, or other people with habitat and botanical skills, would like to participate you would be most welcome. Please either contact the SBG via Chris Billinghurst on 01761 221579 or Val Graham. You might also like to find out if your local parish is participating.

The first zoom session for parish representatives was attended by 200 people, so it seems there is a high level of interest. A video of the meeting is available on the SWT project page.