Some early botany

Several of us visited the Hutchinsia at Craig y Cilau on Wednesday. I like this picture because the Rue-leaved Saxifrage nearby, a small plant itself, gives a sense of the tininess of the Hutchinsia on the right.

Hornungia petraea, Hutchinsia, Beryn y graig.

Why Hutchinsia? - see this: Ellen Hutchins

The other main delight (apart from the spectacular views of course) was an abundance of rosettes of Early-purple Orchid - definitely to be visited again soon.

The team are out recording again with, for instance, four monad 20 year updates for Moschatel (or better - one monad was new).

See our current challenges here.

Tess has found Tuberous Comfrey straying from a garden into the wild for only the third county record.

Symphytum tuberosum, Tuberous Comfrey, Cyfardwf Oddfynog (Tess Lister)

And I took a new photo of the White Comfrey on a Llangattock verge, spotted by Ray Woods a few years back.

Symphytum orientale, White Comfrey, Cyfardwf wen

Small-flowered Catchfly

 Not recorded since 1950 but seen last week by Ray Woods at the edges of a Swede field.

Small-flowered Catchfly, Gludlys amryliw, Silene gallica

So the history in the county goes: “Pen y lan, near Brecon” by Miss Bird in 1809, J A Wade (NMW), no date given but between 1930 and 1950 and now this. The species is in decline in the country - as an arable weed but this finding suggests there may be a long-lived seed bank.

The Molinia Horribleness scale

 No exciting finds this week for the group (but a member, Anne found a Musk Thistle on the Usk):

Carduus nutans, Musk Thistle

The main group outing though always looked like a rather dim hope of great finds but at least we got some records for an unrecorded tetrad.

The outward walk was very hard going in boggy tussocky Molinia caerulea, Purple Moor-grass which I decided was at least an 8 on the Molinia horribleness scale* which I had just thought up.

And no rewards of any note for peering into the boggier bits with only a few records on the whole outward journey. We got far enough to see more promising land a further kilometre away but decided we had to turn back. 

We did agree to do a different route which we thought, from our observations coming along, might not be so bad - and it wasn't (7 maybe). Crucially though we did on that route find some "better" plants. (Apologies to Soft-rush, Foxglove and Heath Bedstraw - we do appreciate you really!)

Marsh Pennywort and Lady's Smock among other rather "better" finds.

The view from as far as we got.

* It goes up to 11...

Quillwort at Llyn Carw

 

Llyn Carw - about 6 km trek across difficult moorland from Dolymynach.

The Cambrian Mountain Society teamed up their walking expertise with botanists last week on this walk to our most remote lake. 

Quillwort was found there in 1979 by Ray Woods and determined to be the rather more rare Spring Quillwort, Isoetes echinspora by S G Harrison at the National Museum of Wales. (He was a co-author of the book that describes them for Wales.)

It was at that time “Common on north and west margins”.

Gill Foulkes, a botanist member of the recent expedition, did find a Quillwort on the other side of the lake. (None was found where the original sample was taken.)

Here it is:

The Quillwort found by Gill Foulkes last week, which turned out to be Isoetes lacustris

You have to sacrifice a leaf to prove it's a Quillwort:

And knowing which one needs these megaspores to be examined:

They are about 0.5 mm across...

So maybe the lake does actually still have both of these Quillwort species (the north and west has the more suitable habitat for Spring Quillwort).

Further expeditions are required!

And the members of this walk did prove that botany and long walks can be compatible - with a good recce prior to the day...

An exciting find and other matters

 A record popped up on iRecord last week that is a great new find for the Vice County.

We already have the most southerly occurrence of Circaea alpina (Alpine Enchanter's Nightshade) in the British Isles I think but our one small (and somewhat struggling) population at Craig y Cilau is now joined by a substantial and healthy population found by Sam Thomas while visiting the (also very rare) population of Sorbus stenophylla near Capel y Ffin in the Llanthony valley.

Circaea alpina (Alpine Enchanter's Nightshade) picture, Sam Thomas

Sam said "The rain was torrential and we started from the top which was an unwise choice, once we'd seen the Sorbus we decided to cut straight down the cliff to escape the rain as quickly as possible. We found the Circaea on the way down. It was in a very inaccessible location so not that surprising that it hadn't been found before."

There are a good number of plants on at least two levels of a small, mossy flushed cliff . The Brecknock Botany Group will be visiting next year in early July to collect a herbarium specimen and see it for themselves (those up to the intrepid climb...)

Another picture by Jacques Turner-Moss 

In other - less exciting news, the group have been filling in some upland under-recorded tetrads - sometimes with surprising finds - and certainly with many extra map dots for axiophytes of the county.

We have noticed that this year's weather has really suited Hypericum humifusum with many more records than usual of much larger and well-spreading plants than we usually see.

Hypericum humifusum, Trailing St John's-wort above the Irfon river

Yet another round up

A first for many of us last Wednesday when eagle-eyed Arlene spotted Adder's Tongue (a fern) in lightly grazed turf near Talgarth. 

Two well-matured fronds fronds of Ophioglossum vulgatum, Adder's Tongue, from Wednesday. Only a few had well-developed fruiting bodies as here. The first population spotted was much less noticeable than this.

It isn't often recorded these days in the county and was a new find for most of the group. (As for myself, I have seen it before and even spotted it in the past on more sparsely vegetated sites but I would not have picked these ones out from the abundant Celandine leaves among the grass I am sure.)

Claire took this picture of Changing forget-me-not which we found on the same excursion:

Myosotis discolor subsp. dubia, Changing Forget-me-not, this is the subspecies we see more often which starts with white flowers turning to blue.

The week before it was good to be reminded that Navelwort doesn't only grow on walls. This was north of Brecon.

Umbilicus rupestris, Navelwort near Llandefaelog fach.

And a reminder that our Adoxa hunt is on again this year. This picture from Stephen. See details of the Adoxa hunt here.

Adoxa moschatellina, Moschatel

There are many other hunt challenges - see here and here.

Chasing Wild Geese

 It was a little late in the season to catch Llyn y Fan Fawr with a low water level but, spurred on by the news that its Carmarthenshire counterpart (Llyn y Fan Fach) had revealed some exciting finds when its level dropped dramatically this year, we decided to try.

At least the weather was reasonably kind to us and we found Quillwort or Isoetes lacustris which hasn't been recorded there since 1972. 

Luck played a part but also having shore bound colleagues pointing out where to go helped a lot (they could see better than I could from above). I didn't even need to get my feet wet (just) as I waded in my Wellingtons beyond where the common Shoreweed grew.

The only picture I have is from my microscope showing the characteristic division of the leaf cross section into four compartments so here is a drawing from an old book:

And my cross-sections:

I didn't photograph the lake but the upper reaches of the Tawe, which we followed from it's source on the way back made for some nice snaps.

Half a year gone

 And we have been active.

Members of the botany group were invited to update our records for Townhall Clock - Adoxa moschatellina from early March.

Adoxa moschatellina at Pwll y Wrach Nature Reserve, Talgarth

Results are pretty much now in (it is hard to spot and record from now on and often completely died back).

It was refound in 21 of the target monads (1km squares) with Gaye and Lynne finding the longest "lost" population near Crickhowell (last seen 1957). (All the updates were for squares where it had not been seen since 1999.)

There were records from 34 squares where the species had never before been recorded. Other records stretched from near Craig y nos (the species peters out to the south west there) to Cilmery near Builth Wells.

Click here for the full results.

A welcome find

In October I received a report from Julie of Stag's-horn Clubmoss on Llangoed common. Several members of the recording group got there to check this out before I did and my group was initially dumbfounded to discover that we couldn't find it despite having good grid references. So after a while we decided to give up at one of the couple of  locations reported and set off for another only for Claire, who was leading, to call back that she had found it not 100m from where we had given up. Either the satellites were wonky that day or on the day of the earlier reports and we had been focussing too much on exact grid refs and managing to miss the populations while toing and froing!

Stag's-horn Clubmoss, Cnwp-fwsogl corn carw or Lycopodium clavatum

at Llangoed common

Never mind - once found and with our "eye's in" we established that the population was very large - certainly a more established and abundant population than had been found in such a habitat in this county for many years.

The common itself is a delight and very carefully managed - the Bracken control (which was active at the time of discovery) being very effective at creating conditions for the Clubmoss to thrive.

And on the opposite bank of the stream the grassland was home to many wonderful Waxcaps - it's a well we had Ray with us to name them all.

Scarlet waxcap or Hygrocybe coccinea at Llangoed common

Steph, who visited later on, found native White-clawed crayfish in the stream - adding to the good habitat rating for the area.

This picture alludes to our initial confusion!

Botany 2021 - part 2

The group have been very active in the latter part of the year, in many cases without my active participation.

On 25th June, we visited the Carex limosa site on the Vice County border previously discovered by Barry Stewart in 2001. This is at least 50km as the crow flies from the nearest other known sites near Swansea.

Bog-sedge or Hesgen eurwerdd, Carex limosa on a Peat bog on Llangattock Mountain

Needless the say the whole area was interesting and we also saw Cranberry in some profusion.

Cranberry or Llygaeren, Vaccinium oxycoccos in a flush near the Carex

The beginning of July saw a group of us undertake a couple of days botanising in the remote north-west of the county, staying at the hostel at Dolgoch. It was a very wet weekend but we were delighted to encounter a field high up under Craig Carreg-fan with abundant Viola lutea.

Mountain Pansy or Trilliw y mynydd, Viola lutea

We climbed up higher and this view back just shows (centre lowdown) the zigzag path through bracken by which we approached the rocks above.

The group excursion outside the county this year took us to Cors Fochno just inland at Borth to see the Irish Ladies Tresses that now have settled there. It was agreat day and we enjoyed the other bog plants as well.

Irish Lady's-tresses or Troellig Wyddelig, Spiranthes romanzoffiana at Cors Fochno

A few other highlights:

Lunch time at the edge of the Epynt

Blue Fleabane or Amrhydlwyd glas, Erigeron acris (Erigeron acer) on Gilwern Hill 

(Picture Anne Griffiths)

Yellow Bird's-nest or Cytwf, Hypopitys monotropa (Monotropa hypopitys) at Cwm Clydach

(Picture Anne Griffiths)

Botany 2021 in Brecknock

The Botany Group has not been entirely inactive with a lot of individual work proceeding from early on (within guidelines) and more recently we have done some group surveys.

Here are a few highlights so far.

Primroses on the canal

Common Whitlowgrass, Llysiau’r-bystwn ar or Erophila verna was abundant around Brecon and Hay

We found Hay-scented Buckler-fern, Marchredynen bêr or Dryopteris aemula near the Pyrddin river

Bird's-nest Orchid, Tegeirian nyth aderyn or Neottia nidus-avis
found in some quantity near Builth by R Gibbins

A Hybrid Sedge, Carex x prolixa or Carex acuta x elata found in wet Alder wood.

Choke disease, Epichloe typhina (probably) on Poa in the same woodland.

Too long for botany

Three of us set out on a long walk last Sunday from a car park near Abergwesyn to the Llyn Brianne Reservoir. Abergwesyn itself seems remote in our county and the drive between our start point and the place where we met the road again is a long one of over 10 miles over the "Devil's staircase". The walk up Cwm Culent and down Cwm Garach was "only" about 3 miles. I say only as it was quite tough going at times with much boggy and tussocky ground.

We returned through forestry and past the Cefn Fanog trig point (lost in the trees). This return route may have been a greater climb but was actually easier - thankfully.

(The trig point has been photographed by Trig Point baggers - see this, but we didn't bother visiting it!)

There was plenty to see including this very tall and flowering Bush Vetch. There was similarly robust Meadow Vetchling nearby.

Bush Vetch, Ffacbysen y cloddiau or Vicia sepium

There were several abandoned homesteads in the valleys and anthill meadows like this.

Anthills on Nant Culent near Abegwesyn

As can be seen the conditions were not good to start with.

Steph noticed some Bell-heather sheltering from grazing under Gorse:

Bell Heather, Grug y mêl or Erica cinerea

This species is surprisingly uncommon in the county and this record has added a green dot to this map:

We saw a fogbow as the mist started clearing around us.

Below Cefn Fanog

(A fog bow, sometimes called a white rainbow, is a similar phenomenon to a rainbow; however, as its name suggests, it appears as a bow in fog rather than rain. Because of the very small size of water droplets that cause fog—smaller than 0.05 millimeters the fog bow has only very weak colors.)

This is the view back from where we came once we got to the reservoir road.

From the Llyn Brianne reservoir road

Llyn Brianne reservoir from our lunch spot.

Looking down from Cefn Fanog on the way back.