Galium verum subsp. maritimum - new by promotion
There has long been known a variety of Lady's Bedstraw Galium verum var. maritimum that grows on sand-dunes and sea- cliffs. I have known it on the grey dune at Sammy's Point, TA3916, for several years and as a variety it has never been formally recorded in vc61. On receipt of the BSBI Atlas 2020 Notes on identification works etc. received this week I noted that this variety has been promoted to subspecies status after Sell & Murrell. In passing today, I stopped to collect a small voucher specimen. It is a dwarf, sprawling, prostrate plant with the leaves distinctly longer than the distance between whorls (internodes). The photograph does not show the whole plant but the leaf-internode length relationship is clearly visible. It is a plant worth looking out for.
Peter J Cook, 8 October 2015
The alternative name, "Sea Tomato", is apt with the large luscious red fruits and love of growing by the sea. As a one-time denizen of Suffolk I often saw this plant apparently naturalized on dunes and sometimes on the beach as far down as the strandline. There is an old coastal record for Tunstall, presumably Sand-le-Mere, and a more recent one South of Bridlington. Over the last few years I have botanized all our scarce resource of dunes and now have records for R. rugosa from all of them between Bridlington and Spurn where, in each place, the plant seems to be comfortably at home spreading vegetatively and, at Easington with certainty, by seed. I suspect that our coastal plants arrived naturally as fruit in flotsam. They look determined to stay and hopefully will not spread and overwhelm dune integrity.
While walking along a wheat stubble margin near Barmston, TA16Q, on 16 September I saw a patch of at least 50 small ~13cm) sub-erect umbellifer plants and thought it to be Shepherd's Needle until I saw the fruit. I'd read of the existence of several subspecies of Fool's Parsley so sacrificed a voucher specimen. Our usual plant, Aethusa cynapium subsp. cynapium, is erect and may attain heights of 1 m with its longest pedicels less than half the length of the bracteoles, and fruiting pedicels twice as long as the fruits. The taxon found here, A. cynapium subsp. agrestis, is very different in never being more than 20 cm high and with longest pedicels about the same length as the bracteoles and fruiting pedicels shorter than the fruits. The photograph above, though slightly out of focus, shows this fairly clearly. BSBI maps show this to be a mainly southern taxon although it has been recorded near to us in vcs 62 and 64.
We were delighted to hear that Paris quadrifolia has been re-discovered in East Yorkshire - Ken White has found a thriving colony of this plant growing in a wood near Jeffry Bog. This is the first record in the vice-county this millennium and improves its status from "regionally extinct" to "rare".
Dr Ray Goulder has re-found the Greater Water-parsnip in Leven Canal. The above picture shows a single plant at the canal edge near Sandholme Bridge. Also seen were Hottonia palustris (Water Violet) and Utricularia vulgaris (Bladderwort).
Wood Small-reed Calamagrostis epigejos (now epigeios) occurs in and around Hull in waste places near docks and on road verges. On the west side of the vice county it occupies damp woods, ditches and fens. According to descriptions in many sources these are the natural habitats for the species. It has also long been known as a grass of dune slacks and coastal grassland throughout the Baltic and N European coasts where it occurs with or near Marram and possibly in its natural association. What a pleasant surprise it was to find a substantial (5m x 5m) stand of C. epigeios growing seemingly 'at home' with Common reed Phragmites australis, Sea Couch Elytrigia atherica and Wild celery Apium graveolens on the slack of Marram dunes at the Beacon Lagoons Nature Reserve at TA413168. This find helps to substantiate a description of NVC S24 as one of many here that contribute significantly to their designation as Priority Habitat BH19 supralittoral sediment. In any case, this is a 'good find' to start the month.
An interesting visit to this little-frequented part of the vice-county. The most significant find was, undoubtedly, Hemlock Water-dropwort (Oenanthe crocata), seed head pictured above left, which occurred both on the river bank and in a ditch near Laxton. Again near the river bank was an interesting Poplar tree which, although undoubtedly planted, the burry trunk (above right) showed to be the native Black Poplar (Populus nigra subsp. betulifolia).
This site was visited on 26 June as part of one of Yorkshire Coast Nature's Botany Days. It is a new wetland reserve on Thornwick Farm Holiday Centre which is part sponsored by Wold Ecology Ltd. Much of the grassland area is naturally regenerated flora on compressed clay moved in the excavation of ponds. Low areas are impervious and encrusted with the cup lichen Cladonia fimbriata with scattered Blackstonia perfoliata and Centaurium erythraea representing a 'combo' ideal for bee orchid but, after much searching, none was found. However, looser bare soil was occupied by some scarce arable weeds such as Stachys, Viola and Spergula arvensis , and Fallopia convolvulus. Longer grass contained Dactylorrhiza purpurea, Koeleria macrantha betraying the chalky substrate, and both Vicia tetrasperma and V. hirsuta with abundant and sometimes luxuriant Trifolium campestre. The most significant find was Fumaria parviflora (picture). Not recorded was a suite of wildflower mix species and patently planted shrubs, and the complete list was reduced to those species not recorded on 18 April, pushing the overall tetrad total above the 'gold standard' of 200 with some notable finds.
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