My laboratory
Nora’s study of bird behaviour explores how small bird communities flock together to ward off larger predators. Nature has many things to teach us and is now widely acknowledged as a key…
Nora’s study of bird behaviour explores how small bird communities flock together to ward off larger predators. Nature has many things to teach us and is now widely acknowledged as a key…
Creeping jenny is a low-growing plant of wet grasslands, riverbanks, ponds and wet woods. It has cup-like, yellow flowers and is a popular choice for garden ponds.
With club-shaped leaflets on its fronds, wall-rue is easy to spot as it grows out of crevices in walls. Plant it in your garden rockery to provide cover for insects.
Look for the pretty, azure-blue flowers of Wood forget-me-not along woodland rides and hedgerows, and in ancient and wet woodlands. Varieties of this flower for the garden are very popular.
Hedgerows are one of our most easily encountered wildlife habitats, found lining roads, railways and footpaths, bordering fields and gardens and on the coast.
These are the atmospheric oak woods of the Celtic upland fringes, where the mild, moist oceanic climate allows luxurious mats of mosses to carpet the rocky ground and creep up gnarled trunks,…
Often confused with the larger but similarly shaped lion’s mane jellyfish, the blue jellyfish can be colourless when young and develop a striking blue-purple bell as it matures.
With its familiar features, the Field pansy is a delicate version of a garden favourite. Usually creamy-yellow in colour, it can be seen in fields and on roadside verges and waste ground.
Golden banks of common rock-rose make a spectacular sight on our chalk and limestone grasslands in summer. A creeping shrub, it is good for bees, moths and butterflies.
Typical of softly rolling pastoral landscapes, the short, aromatic turf of lowland calcareous grassland is flower-rich and humming with insects in the summer. Its long use by humans lends it an…
You are likely to spot the smooth newt in your garden or local pond. It breeds in water in summer and spends the rest of the year in grassland and woodland, hibernating over winter.
This stocky wader is mostly a winter visitor to the UK, where it can be found on rocky, seaweed-covered coasts, often with groups of turnstones.