Familiar as the bristly plant that easily hooks on to our clothing as we walk through the countryside or do the gardening, cleavers uses its hooks to help it climb and to disperse its seeds.

Greater burdock is familiar to us as the sticky plant that children delight in, frequently throwing the burs at each other. It actually uses these hooked seed heads to help disperse its seeds.

The little grebe is a fantastic diver, but to help it swim underwater, its feet are placed towards the back of its body, making it rather clumsy on land. It only really comes ashore to breed.

The gudgeon is a bottom-dwelling fish, similar to the stone loach, but with only two whisker-like barbels near its mouth. These sensory organs help it to find its prey in the sand and gravel of…

The dense, spiky tufts of Marram grass are a familiar sight on our windswept coasts. In fact, its matted roots help to stabilise sand dunes, allowing them to grow up and become colonised by other…