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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 09/08/2026

A pleasure to see Trifolium fragiferum - Strawberry Clover still just about flowering at AWT Walborough reserve. #WildflowerHour

Flowers like fluffy pink pompoms with brown prongs sticking out. They don't look like strawberries at all.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 09/08/2026

Spergularia marina - Lesser Sea Spurrey and S. media - Greater Sea Spurrey still giving flowering a go (yes we were back #ByTheSea this week!) #WildflowerHour

Lesser sea spurrey, deep pink five-petalled flowers against a mix of green (fresh) and yellow (drying) buds.

Greater sea spurrey, pale pink to white five petalled flowers against rounded green and brown buds.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 09/08/2026

Cirsium vulgare - Spear thistle and C. arvense - Creeping thistle, still hanging on in the parched meadow. #WildflowerHour #DaisyFamily

Purple pompom like flowers emerging from spiky green buds.

Creeping thistle. Spiky green leaves beneath, then elongated buds with a shock of pale purple hair - rather as if Beaker in the Muppets had had a dye job.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 09/08/2026

Pulicaria dysenterica - Common fleabane, looking as if it hasn't even noticed the drought. #WildflowerHour #DaisyFamily

Bright yellow sun-like flowers against green leaves.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 02/08/2026

Artemisia maritima - Sea Wormwood and Sporobolus anglicus - Common Cordgrass, on the saltmarsh at Walborough. #WildflowerHour #ByTheSea

Artemisia maritima - Sea Wormword, a ghostly whitish-green, fine-leaved plant growing amongst the grasses.

Sporobolus anglicus - Common Cordgrass. Long green spikes bearing lots of white tassels. The ground is cracked and parched.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 02/08/2026

Limonium vulgare - Common Sea-Lavender and Spergularia media - Greater Sea-Spurrey, still flowering #ByTheSea at Avon WT Walborough nature reserve near Weston-super-Mare. #WildflowerHour

Limonium vulgare - Common Sea-Lavender. Beautiful pale purple flowers against wide strapping leaves. Doesn't look or smell anything like land lavender!

Spergularia media - Greater Sea-Spurrey. Five-petalled white flowers (though they had a pink flush too) with yellow centres above needle-like leaves.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 23/07/2026

A stunning wasp spider at Avon WT Goblin Combe - first record for the site? The zigzag woven into the web below her is a feature of this species.

A spider hangs head down on a web. She is wearing a very natty black, yellow and white striped jumper with 8 matching leggings.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 19/07/2026

This common centaury (Centaurium erythraea) has been enjoying the protective shade of some bramble leaves. #StillFlowering at AWT Goblin Combe. #WildflowerHour

Pink flowers like five-pointed pink stars with yellow centres rise out of a background of dark green leaves.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 19/07/2026

A carline thistle (Carline vulgaris) with, unbelievably, some GREEN foliage on it! (Never seen one before that wasn't entirely brown whatever the weather). #StillFlowering at AWT Goblin Combe this week. #WildflowerHour

A brown flower with prickly green leaves in brown grass

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 12/07/2026

Yellow-wort (Blackstonia perfoliata) trying to rival the effulgency of the sun beating down on it. #WildflowerHour

A bright, bright yellow starry flower growing out of rocky scree in the sunlight.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 12/07/2026

A hot day on the grassland at Avon WT Goblin Combe but Dwarf Thistle (Cirsium acaule) and Harebell (Campanula rotundifolia) still manage to look fresh! #WildflowerHour

Dwarf thistle, a purple pompom like flower sitting at the centre of a green spiky rosette.

Looking like a lovely pale blue bell made out of crepe paper, a Harebell grows out of the grass.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 21/06/2026

Common vervain (Verbena officinalis) and Common Centaury (Centaurium erythraea). #WildflowerHour

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 21/06/2026

According to Buglife, 30 species of insect are completely dependent upon Ragwort (Senecio jacobaea). One of these is the cinnabar moth (Tyria jacobaeae - see the clue in the name?) The adult - one of our #PollinatorPals - was camera shy but the kids proved to be better behaved. #WildflowerHour

A red blur against green leaves, which was all I could get of the black and red Cinnabar Moth as it took off just as I took the picture!

Cinnabar moth caterpillars, amazing in their black and orange stripes.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 21/06/2026

Two hoverflies, Marmalade (Episyrphus balteatus) and I think a Common Globetail (Sphaerophoria scripta) show their stripes against the glorious yellow of cinquefoil (Potentilla reptans). #PollinatorPals #WildflowerHour

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 21/06/2026

Bramble at AWT Goblin Combe attracting plenty of #PollinatorPals this week. Red-tailed Bumblebee (Bombus lapidarius) and Marmalade Hoverfly (Episyrphus balteatus) both enjoyed burrowing into the flowers. #WildflowerHour

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 14/06/2026

More from my mini-meadow! My Fox and Cubs (Pilosella aurantiaca) are romping away, and I also have a St John's Wort (Hypericum sp) though I forgot to check what kind... #WildflowerHour #LetItBloomJune

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 14/06/2026

Up the road from the church, here is Wall Pennywort (Umbilicus rupestris) on a wall where I expect to find it, in its more usual company of Ivy-leaved Toadflax (Cymbalaria muralis - muralis means 'of the wall') and Rustyback fern (Asplenium ceterach). #WildflowerHour

Weird spikes of bright green bell flowers rise up from a grey wall covered in white and orange lichen spots. In the foreground is green and russet fern leaves, in the middle the purple flowers and green leaves of toadflax.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 14/06/2026

I was temporarily flummoxed by these #ChurchyardFlowers before realising they were a congregation of Wall Pennywort (or Navelwort, Umbilicus rupestris) but not on a wall where I expect to find it! Instead it is enjoying the gravel round a gravestone. A horizontal wall I suppose. #WildflowerHour

A red stem covered in bright green bell-like flowers forms a tall spike in the foreground, obscuring a gravestone which is disappearing under a tangle of grasses. A Celtic cross (a cross with a circle round it) rises out of the grass behind it, and behind that is the wall and arched window of a church.

Several spikes of bright green bell-like flowers crowd around a gravestone as if approaching it. One of them appears to be bending a sinuous neck, a bit like a flamingo. This is Wall Pennywort, which I always think looks like something that has just walked, crept or oozed off the set of Dr Who.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 14/06/2026

More #ChurchyardFlowers for #WildflowerHour. The pink flowers of Common Mallow (Malva sylvestris) and tiny white-lilac blooms, plus hairy pods, of Hairy Tare (Vicia hirsuta).

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 14/06/2026

Happy to see the #ChurchyardFlowers challenge as I revisited one of my lockdown cycle ride destinations. (I live in a new town with no churchyards!) Here is Smooth Hawk's-beard, with friend, and Green Alkanet shown off against a gravestone. #WildflowerHour

Three lemon-yellow starbursts of flowers with a hoverfly sitting on one. Grass and grey stone in the background.

A blue flower of Green alkanet, Pentaglottis sempervirens, perched atop its spike of green leaves, shown up against a grey gravestone behind. There are also hairy barley heads. A hoverfly is partly hidden behind a blade of grass. Below are the yellow flowers of a buttercup (I forgot to check which kind!)

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 31/05/2026

Finally from the mini-meadow, Bulbous Buttercup (Ranunculus bulbosus) and White Clover (Trifolium repens). Still plenty of things coming up! #WildflowerHour #NoMowMay

A yellow flower with its triangular sepals pointing downwards underneath, indicating this is a Bulbous Buttercup.

A round flower head made up dozens of the tiniest white flowers

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 31/05/2026

Don't forget the flowering grasses in the mini-meadow! Crested Dog's-tail (Cynosurus cristatus) wags happily above Cock's-foot (Dactylis glomerata), while Annual Meadow-grass (Poa annua) is getting on with Sweet Vernal Grass (Anthoxanthum odoratum) #WildflowerHour #NoMowMay

Just like a green Labrador tail, a spike of Crested dog's tail grass is sticking up above the more spread-out, pale green bushy seedheads of Cock's-foot.

The seedheads of Annual Meadow=grass are like little pale branching trees, the seedheads of sweet vernal grass are spikier.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 31/05/2026

Some Asteraceae from the mini-meadow. Beaked Hawksbeard (Crepis vesicaria), Common Cat's-ear (Hypochaeris radicata) and Mouse-ear Hawkweed (Pilosella officinarum). #NoMowMay #WildflowerHour

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 31/05/2026

It's the last day of #NoMowMay (not that I am about to start mowing again, still too much coming up!) And it is all yellow in my mini-meadow. Yellow Rattle (Rhinanthus minor) and Lesser Trefoil (Trifolium dubium) to start. #WildflowerHour

Yellow rattle, looking a bit like an alien with a yellow beak waving green serrated arms.

Yellow pompoms of flowers above a cloud of green leaves.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 31/05/2026

Foxgloves standing tall at Avon WT Goblin Combe reserve. #WildflowerHour

Tall spikes of bright pink bell-like flowers in front of a heap of brash and bramble.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 31/05/2026

Hairy Tare (Vicia hirsuta) on a school fence. Two seeds per pod. #WildflowerHour

Delicate pointed narrow leaves and a tiny white flower.

Seed pods, very hairy but very tiny pea pods showing 2 seeds each.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 24/05/2026

Germander Speedwell, Wild Strawberry, Scarlet Pimpernel and Common Mouse-ear all at AWT Goblin Combe this week. #WildflowerHour

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 24/05/2026

A couple of Potentillas strutting their stuff; Silverweed (P.anserina) and Tormentil (P. erecta). #WildflowerHour

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 24/05/2026

Heath Speedwell has been putting on its own #WildFlowerShow all by itself - I found both purple and white varieties. #WildflowerHour

Spikes of dainty pale purple flowers with darker purple stripes against a background of green.

Spikes of white flowers against green leaves.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 24/05/2026

This Bird's-foot Trefoil has got all dressed up for today's #WildFlowerShow by wearing Heath Speedwell as a bonnet. #WildflowerHour

A cluster of bright yellow flowers, like a gaggle of cheery ladies in bonnets gossiping, is topped by a spray of delicate purple flowers and the effect is rather jolly.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 17/05/2026

A couple of #TinyPlants from my #NoMowMay front 'lawn'; cut-leaved crane's-bill, Geranium dissectum, and a cornsalad (Valerianella) - I'm told you can't identify the species until they fruit, which I've never managed to catch them doing. #WildflowerHour

A tiny pink flower against a green filigree of lacy leaves

Two perfect little bouquets of the teeniest tiniest five-petalled white flowers against plain green leaves

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 17/05/2026

Really a very tiny plant and tricky to focus on! After some puzzling with the book we decided this was Annual Pearlwort, Sagina apetala, but happy to be corrected... #WildflowerHour #TinyPlants

Semi-translucent greenish-white flowers and some green buds. These flowers were only about 2mm across.

Green flower stalks and tiny translucent flowers growing amongst brown shards of fallen beech mast which is dwarfing them.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 17/05/2026

Two tiny speedwells for #WildflowerHour #TinyPlants. Veronica officinalis (Heath Speedwell), a new one for me, and V. serpyllifolia (Thyme-leaved Speedwell).

A spike of lilac-and-purple striped flowers. It's close up so you don't really know that they are only about 5mm across.

A spike of blue and white flowers with neat green leaves.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 10/05/2026

Alas, couldn't make #WildflowerHour but found such lovely #CarrotsAndPeas at Avon WT Walborough I still want to share them even if late! My favourite tiniest carrot, Honewort, and Horseshoe Vetch.

Honewort - A little plant dwarfed by grass stems, bearing puffs of frothy cream flowers.

Bright yellow flowers arranged in a U shape, hence the name Horseshoe Vetch.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 22/03/2026

Smyrnium olusatrum, Alexanders, a member of the carrot family. Introduced by the Romans as a vegetable - they ate most of it, even pickling the flower heads. Later it was grown in monastery gardens. It also has general medicinal properties. #WildflowerHour #StoryPlants

A plant with green shiny leaves and pom-poms of lime green flowers.

Lime green flowers on stalks spreading like umbrella spokes. Two bright red ladybirds are exploring the flowers.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 22/03/2026

I was delighted to find my favourite flower yesterday. Adoxa moschatellina - Moschatel. 'Adoxa' means 'without glory' as it is so tiny and green! Its other common name, Town-hall Clock, refers to its arrangement of four flowers in a cube - like clock faces - with an extra one on top. #WildflowerHour

Tiny green flowers, composed of five flowers arranged in a cube, rise out of a sea of green leaves.

Three lime green flowers made of multiple florets arranged in a cube shape.

A bright lime green flower with a tiny fly riding on the top.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 22/03/2026

Glechoma hederacea, Ground-ivy. Bitter-tasting, it was sometimes used instead of hops to flavour ale, hence another common name, 'ale-hoof'. Gerard's Herbal says it can also treat ‘the humming noyse and ringing sound of the eares’ (tinnitus) but I'm not sure how... #WildflowerHour #StoryPlants

Purple flowers amongst green leaves on a very hairy stem

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 07/09/2025

This plant popped up in my garden. I didn't know it and have found it's Fagopyrum esculentum - Common buckwheat, presumably dropped from the bird feeder. In my ignorance, I had assumed 'buckwheat' was a cereal crop in the grasses family, like ordinary wheat... now I know! #WildflowerHour

A cluster of white flowers held amidst heart-shaped green leaves.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 07/09/2025

Carlina vulgaris - Carline thistle, on a parched hillside. Is it alive? Is it dead? With Carline thistle, who knows? Looks the same either way. #WildflowerHour

Pale brown daisy-like flowers above brown spiky leaves growing in parched brown grass. It looks like a sepia toned image but that's the real colour I promise!

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 07/09/2025

Out at Avon Wildlife Trust's wonderful reserve at Walborough this week to count Autumn Lady's-tresses, Spiranthes spiralis, on a very windy hillside above the saltmarsh. Despite how dry it's been I think we got nearly 300. #WildflowerHour

Two Autumn lady's-tresses orchids, tiny plants a finger high, green spirals dangling tiny white bells, push up through the parched grass on a hillside. In the background is a flat green saltmarsh and beyond that the sea.

Two Autumn lady's-tresses orchids, green stalks bearing segmented green spirals dangling tiny white bells.

A tiny Autumn lady's-tresses orchids, the twisting flowers covered in a down of tiny white hairs.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 22/06/2025

Alas, no aquatic plants at Farmoor reservoir (too many birds, fish and boats!) but lots of terrestrial ones for me and mum to see round the (nice, flat, wheelchair-friendly) path including Large-flowered Evening Primrose, Mugwort and a fine Pyramidal Orchid. #WildflowerHour

Large-flowered Evening Primrose (Oenothera glazioviana) with, well, large, blowsy, yellow flowers! Growing on a dry grassy bank with reservoir in the background.

Common Mugwort (Artemisia vulgaris) - slender white fronds of flowers showing up against dark water behind.

A fine Pyramidal Orchid (Anacamptis pyramidalis) - looking more cylindrical than pyramidal, rather like a raspberry ice cream lolly.

My mum, an old lady in a wheelchair, wearing a sunhat, contemplating the Pyramidal Orchid with the reservoir in the background.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 15/06/2025

Common Field-speedwell (Veronica persica) poking through a school fence, and Musk Mallow (Malva moschata) growing alongside litter smack in the middle of a road, on the crossing island #WildflowerHour #UrbanPlants

A tiny bright blue and white flower striped with darker blue pokes through green wire netting

Big frilly pink flowers and leaves like delicate green lace grow out of dead leaves and litter next to a concrete barrier and metal railings

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 15/06/2025

look at this absolute unit Giant Hogweed next to the River Frome as it comes into the centre of Bristol For carrot family comparison, next to it is an ordinary Hogweed trying to look big and realising its mistake, plus Hemlock Water Dropwort trying to hide #WildflowerHour #UrbanPlants

Giant Hogweed, Heracleum mantegazzianum. Massive white umbrella-like flowers and huge spiky leaves growing next to a grey wall. Couldn't possibly look like anything else as nothing else looks this much like a Triffid that is considering eating you.

A lot of green plants growing near a riverbank, including the white frothy flowers of Hogweed, Hemlock Water-dropwort and Giant Hogweed towering over them all.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 08/06/2025

Meadow vetchling (Lathyrus pratensis), Spotted Medick (Medicago arabica), White Clover (Trifolium repens) and Lesser Trefoil (Trifolium dubium) found on a rather damp #PeaFamily hunt. #WildflowerHour

Meadow vetchling, Lathyrus pratensis, a bouquet of yellow flowers held delicately at the end of a long stem.

Spotted Medick, Medicago arabica, a little yellow flower surrounded by wide green leaves each with a heart-shaped brown spot in the centre.

White Clover, Trifolium repens, being unnecessarily dramatic, rising out of the grass stems like the White Queen from a stage trapdoor.

Lesser trefoil, Trifolium dubium, tiny bunches of yellow flowers amongst equally tiny leaves.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 25/05/2025

I always think that navelwort or wall pennywort (Umbilicus rupestris) looks as if it has come in costume straight off a Dr Who set. #WildFlowerHour

An old stone wall out of which is growing the most extraordinary plant consisting of beaded spiky cones and round fleshy leaves. If you've seen Dr Who monsters from the 1970s, it looks like that.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 25/05/2025

Purple Toadflax (Linaria purpurea), Red Valerian (Cetranthus ruber) and Beaked Hawk’s-beard (Crepis vesicaria) peek cautiously through a gate to see their friends on the other side. #WildFlowerHour #WildFlowerShow

Purple, pink and yellow flowers grow next to an old farm gate. The concrete drive on the other side is getting overgrown by pink and white flowers.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 25/05/2025

Long abandoned garage door at Avon Wildlife Trust’s new purchase, Ebdon Farm. Now ivy curtains frame a #WildFlowerShow of Oxeye and Common daisies, Mexican fleabane, Red Valerian and Beaked Hawk’s-beard. #WildFlowerHour

A once very ordinary buff coloured garage door is now beautifully framed by green ivy curtains and in front of the door is a riot of pink, white and yellow flowers. Clearly no one has opened this garage for a very long time!

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 18/05/2025

Update from my mini meadow during #NoMowMay. Meadow Buttercup (Ranunculus acris) with friend, a Thick-legged Flower Beetle (Oedemera nobilis) Beaked Hawksbeard (Crepis vesicaria) Mouse-ear Hawkweed (Pilosella officinarum) @plantlifeuk.bsky.social #WildflowerHour (1/2)

Bright yellow buttercup with a shining green beetle sitting in the flower.

A spray of cheerful yellow flowers, Beaked Hawksbeard.

Lemon yellow flower with red striping on back, and hairy stem; Mouse-ear Hawkweed.

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 18/05/2025

#PinkFamily flowers seen this week - Common Mouse-ear (Cerastium fontanum), Red Campion (Silene dioica) and Ragged Robin (Silene flos-cuculi). #WildflowerHour

Common Mouse-ear - one tiny white flower and several buds amongst blades of grass.

Red Campion, intensely pink flowers with an inflated dark pink calyx behind them.

Ragged Robin, pale pink flowers looking very straggly and upset and worse for wear - but they're supposed to look like that!

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Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist @badbotanist.bsky.social · 03/05/2025

I have been doing #NoMowMay (and June, July, August... and actually up to April if I miss the late autumn cut) since 2019 on my front 'lawn'. I sowed a handful of yellow rattle seeds... 5 plants came up in 2020... now they are everywhere! Look forward to seeing them! @plantlifeuk.bsky.social

A grass-level view across a cheerfully messy lawn topped with lots of round fuzzy dandelion seed heads

Lots of tiny leaves coming up amongst the soon-to-be-parasitised grass blades

A shoot coming up with ridged leaves - a St John's Wort

White flowers striped with indigo, this is Veronica serpyllifolia, Thyme-leaved Speedwell, dwarfed by the grass blades and clover leaves surrounding it.

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