Plant

Corncockle - one of our rarest plants

As the name suggest, Corncockle is a plant of cultivated cornfields. Due to changes in farming practices, it has been reduced to just one site in the wild - but is now often sown as part of wildflower seed mixes.

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Cleavers - annoyingly successful

Cleavers are those common weeds that have the sticky burrs that end up all over your clothes or your shaggier pets. Also known as goosegrass, 'sticky bobs', 'stick-a-back' and 'kisses'. It is widespread, except for some areas towards the north of Scotland.

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The poppy - vibrant symbol of sacrifice

Before the advent of intensive farming and the use of herbicides, the brilliant scarlet poppy was a common sight growing amongst Britain's corn fields. Its tissue paper bright red flowers were a striking contrast to the golden corn in high summer. In the twentieth century, it became a symbol of bloodshed on the World War One battlefields.

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Meadow crane's-bill

One of the loveliest of the wildflowers of Britain and Ireland, Meadow Crane's-bill (Geranium pratense) flowers are usually violet-blue, and sometimes a very deep blue on chalky soil, but pink and even pure white specimens are also seen occasionally.

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Mistletoe, the mystic plant

Mistletoe is a familiar part of the Christmas tradition, and commonly seem growing wild in Britain. It is an evergreen plant which produces clusters of pearlescent white berries in winter which are favourites with hungry birds such as thrushes.

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Hemlock - a deadly plant closer than you think

Hemlock is the famous poison that killed the Greek philosopher Socrates, which might lead you to think that it is only to be found in the Mediterranean. But that's not true. This deadly member of the carrot family can be found all over the British Isles.

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Rosebay Willowherb - a happy pink tonic for dull spots

The rosebay willowherb is a striking wild plant with tall spires of large pink flowers, and leaves that grow like a staircase around the stem. Often found on the fringes of woodland, it presents a set of dense stands in the summer - attracting pollinators and offering a superficial resemblance to the foxglove.

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'Granny's Bonnet' - the original now much-copied Common Columbine

The Common Columbine is a British wildflower, now with a number of related variants, which may be more familiar to gardeners via its Latin name Aquilegia. Various cultivars of this pretty rich purple-blue wildflower are now available for domestic planting from garden centres, and often prominent at the Chelsea Flower Show.

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Lichens - growing in a world of their own

The often overlooked lichen is a plant with its own unusual way of life. It is a symbiotic organism made up of a fungus and an alga or cyanobacterium (or sometimes both) that can feel at home in almost any location.

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The English strawberry - a tale of three continents

Two plants, from two different continents, were brought together on a third continent - Europe - to make the delicious strawberry we know and love as a British summer treat.

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Glory of a summer hedgerow - the dog rose

The dog rose, Rosa canina, is a scrambling shrub of woodland edges, sand dunes, and hedgerows, and is Britain's most common native wild rose. Another name for it is the briar rose.

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The stinging nettle - a pain and a remedy

The stinging nettle is a very familiar plant in Britain. Once touched - usually by an inquisitive child - it is never forgotten, due to its hollow stinging hairs (trichomes) that pierce the skin like needles, and the irritating rash that follows contact with them. But despite its venom, the nettle does have many uses, both for wildlife and mankind.

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Lavender growing - a traditional British industry recently revived

Lavender is seen as a traditional English plant, and has been the basis of a number of commercial activities, including scent and oil-making. Native to the 'Old World' - Britain and its European neighbours, its vibrant purple hue and intoxicating essence have made the plant popular for scented products, traditional medicine and cosmetics.

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Back from the dead - the Ghost Orchid

If you spot the Ghost Orchid - you're very lucky indeed. Not only is it one of Britain's rarest plants (thought extinct until 2009), but it flowers once every 30 years!

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Ivy - much maligned but vital for nature

Ivy is a common evergreen climbing plant, mistakenly thought to strangle trees. It is now better understood as a great benefit to wildlife - supporting at least 50 species of wildlife. There are two subspecies of ivy native to the UK.

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Harebell - the Scottish bluebell

Often called the bluebell of Scotland, the delicate, papery blue bells of the harebell are a summer delight of grasslands, sand dunes, hedgerows and cliffs.

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Bramble - the naughty but nice blackberry bush

Bearer of the blackberry fruit, the prickly bramble is a fast-growing and invasive wild shrub, common throughout the UK, and happy growing in most locations, particularly where there is an opportunity for it to colonise.

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Chamomile - a disappearing wild treasure

The daisy-like perennial wild plant chamomile is low-growing and spreads by the rhizome stems that it sends out underground horizontally. It has a fresh apple scent when crushed, and for this reason, the Elizabethans planted Chamomile lawns and seats.

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Marsh mallow - good to look at as well as taste

The Marsh Mallow is a British native perennial plant with pale pink flowers, becoming rare in this country. It prefers damp spots, and even waterlogged soil. And, yes, its history is indeed connected to the squidgy sugary confectionery.

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Lesser celandine - brightening spring woodlands and hedgerows

Lesser celandine is a small, low-growing perennial herb in the buttercup family. The cheery yellow flowers can be seen between January and April in damp woodland, shady hedgerows, stream banks and ditches.

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Lilac - adding fragrance to British hedgerows and gardens since the 1500s

One of the delights of late spring is the scent of lilacs - an aroma that carries and lets you know lilacs are nearby even when you can't see the bushes or small trees.

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The meadow buttercup - a pastoral pleasure

The word buttercup is likely to conjure up images of perfect sunny summer leisure days, due to the vibrant sunlike colour of the flowers, and its preference for lush well-watered grassland and meadows that are perfect for picnics.

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Stitchwort - star of the hedgerow

The beautiful wild flower stitchwort seems to be a little known plant, despite being widespread around Britain and very beautiful. Perhaps that's because its charming white flowers appear at the same time as bluebells in April and May. Its favoured habitat is at the base of hedgerows and the edges of woodland.

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Ferns - ancient and innovative plants which fascinated the Victorians

There are 64 known species of ferns in Britain. These are ancient plants, that predate the dinosaurs, most prolific in sheltered woodland areas. They express their life cycle on wet days, when the forest floor becomes alive with reproductive activity.

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Tulips - Jacobean treasure and modern delight

Tulips were once an exotic species of plant that became almost a British obsession. First the Turks, then Europeans - including the British - admired these flowers, and the passion for them was even responsible for a financial crash in the 1600s.

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Sea kale

Sea kale, or crambe, is a species of halophytic (salt-tolerant) flowering plant in the genus Crambe of the family Brassicaceae. It grows wild along the coasts of mainland Europe and the British Isles. It is that giant cabbage-type plant commonly seen on stable shingle beaches.

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The very memorable forget-me-not

The forget-me-not is a British native wildflower that is also popular in gardens, often mixing well in borders with tulips as it flowers through the same period from late March, through April into early May. The evocative name comes from the legend of a romantic tragedy.

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The subtle beauty of Cow Parsley

The delicate white flowers and fernlike leaves of the cow parsley are a familiar sight in early summer, and usually humming with insects. It is a fast-growing plant found throughout the UK, preferring shaded areas, so hedgerows and woodland edges are common places to spot it.

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The white water lily - Britain's largest native wildflower

The white water lily is the only native water lily in Britain, and is also our largest wild flower, with blooms that grow up to 20cm in diameter. It has rounded, leathery, floating leaves, making up large, white flowers that are sometimes tinged with pink and are borne on stalks just above the water.

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The night-scented native honeysuckle

The common honeysuckle, or as Shakespeare describes it in A Midsummer Night's Dream "luscious woodbine", is a deciduous climbing plant famed for its heady scent on summer evenings.

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The cowslip - a spring delight in sunny meadows

The cowslip is a relative of the primrose, and a wildflower that can be seen in spring in meadows and verges, usually preferring dry chalky soil. The cup-shaped, yellow flowers grow in nodding clusters on tall stalks. The leaves are oval and wrinkled like the Primrose.

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Seek out the Scarlet Pimpernel

Once considered a weed of cornfields, the Scarlet Pimpernel is now in decline due to intensive agricultural practices. It can be found in arable fields, on roadside verges and waste ground, and on coastal cliffs.

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The cheery beauty of the wild Speedwell

The common field speedwell is a rather prolific British wildflower, generally treated as a weed, but bringing a cheery beauty to gardens nonetheless. Its tiny blue flowers can be spotted in many a lawn, appearing for most of the year.

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Atropa belladonna - Deadly Nightshade

The Deadly Nightshade is found mainly on chalky soils, in scrub and woodland. Its shiny black berries are highly poisonous to humans, though some mammals and birds can eat them.

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Snake's-head Fritillary - a chequered history

Botanists are uncertain whether the pretty snake's-head fritillary is a native wildflower or a garden escapee. These days it is certainly far more common in our gardens than in its preferred wild spots.

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Gorse - tough staple of British heathland

Gorse is a tough prickly yellow-flowered shrub of the pea family, popularly associated with the wild windy landscapes of open moors around Britain. But it can be found in many habitats, from heaths and coastal grasslands to town verges, parks and gardens. It moat commonly comes into flower early in the year, but varieties may blossom throughout the year.

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Heather - prolific heath and moorland colour

There are six species of heathers native to the UK, and by far the most common and prolific is ling, which occupies lowland heath and vast areas of moorland, from Cornwall to the far north of Scotland.

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Thrift - beautiful pink wild flowers of the British coastline

Perky round tufts of pink are a familiar sight on coastal walks in Britain - often clinging to cliff edges or craggy rocks. This is thrift, or sea pink, a wild flower well-adapted to an environment that defeats many other plants.

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The humble Bugle - flower of woodland glades

The bugle is a low-growing wild flower which produces purplish-blue flower spikes between April and July. Often to be seen on damp grasslands, scrub and woodland clearings on fertile soils, and alongside railway lines, the bugle is common throughout the UK.

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The cornflower - back from the brink

The cornflower is rarely seen these days gracing our arable fields in the summer. It was once a familiar British wildflower in farms and meadows. However, it has become a popular garden annual plant - easy to grow, beautiful, and providing food for many pollinators.

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Daffodils, a bright British sign of Spring

Eternally associated with the poet Wordsworth, the daffodil is surely some carefully bred exotic species? But no, the well-known garden flower definitely belongs here, and has a native wild ancestor in the UK which is nearly as showy as the garden varieties.

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The humble dandelion - curse it and love it

Gardeners may get annoyed with the humble and prolific dandelion, to be found growing rampantly all over Britain, but we would surely be sorry to lose this cheery wild flower, and they are vital to the survival of pollinating insects. And for amusing children!

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Wood anemone - illuminating early spring

Before the bluebells arrive, one of the joys of spring woodland is the wood anemone, carpeting the ground with their luminous white flowers and neat, pretty leaves.

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The blackcurrant - bursting with goodness and easy to grow

Blackcurrants have been growing in the British countryside since at least the 17th century, and this native northern European fruit bush is both a commercial crop, and a very easy to grow plant for gardens and allotments.

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The snowdrop - much-loved winter flower

Almost nothing looks more stoical than the dainty wild snowdrop flowering above snow or bare earth in the depths of winter. Why on earth does it pick such an unpromising time of year to emerge?

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The common daisy, adornment of a sunny lawn

The common daisy is probably Britain's best known wildflower, carpetting many a lawn or grass verge with its long-lasting jolly white and yellow flowers. Purists might regard them as weeds, but to many they bring the spirit of summer.

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Primrose - a sign of Spring flourishing

The Primrose (Primula Vulgaris) is a native plant in Britain, and its pale yellow flowers can be a common sight across the UK. The name derives from the Latin 'prima rosa' ('first rose of the year'), and so they are a sure sign that spring is on its way.

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Garden or Japanese privet - the great British hedging plant

The most common hedging plant in Britain, the privet is sometimes mocked as a symbol of surburbia and conformity. However, privet's success is due to its sheer usefulness - evergreen, healthy, adaptable, fast growing and easy to trim.

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Yellow snowdrops - worth their weight in gold?

Do yellow snowdrops exist? Yes they do (or, at least, snowdrops with yellow markings) and and they are highly sought after. In 2022, a single bulb of Galanthus plicatus 'Golden Tears', bred by Joe Sharman of Monksilver Nursery near Cambridge, sold for £1,850!

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The Fox and Cubs or Orange Hawkweed

A beautiful British wildflower of damp sunny meadows, the fox-and-cubs or orange hawkweed has flowers of a gorgeously fiery orange. It can be found on British lawns all over the country.

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Plants of Britain

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Wild violets, beautiful whether they're scented or not