Botanical Finds Around Dover - May 2024

I had a week's holiday to see family in the last week of May and we booked a farmhouse near Dover in a rural spot with free run of the farm to explore. Formerly living in North West Kent and now Cornwall See https://sylvatica2022.blogspot.com/, it was a nice change of scenery and flora. The following are some of the wonderful plants I found on my travels, both out with family and recording alone in the evenings during our stay.

While walking around the farm, it was noteable that a lot of building work had been done for the holiday accomodations and some areas had imported soil from an unknown source to level areas off. In these areas, I found many garden escapes and exotic plants, such as this Perennial Cornflower below.

Centaurea montana

Borago officinalis - Borage

Hesperis matronalis - Dame's Violet, white form.

However, there were over 200 other species in the 1km square that the farm was in, including the very rural road verges there. There were also two small woodlands and I was very surprised to find Moschatel still in flower this late in the year in one of them.

Adoxa moschatellina

The woods were full of bluebells and wood anemones, though all were now in seed. One damp area in the woods had carpets of Ramsons, a wild garlic. Barring a few flowers, these were in seed, but look at the these seeds, they're quite an amazing structure in themselves.

Allium ursinum

On a field egde, I found some Parsley-piert. These are tiny plants and have even smaller flowers, so a x10 eye loupe is essential to see the details. To separate this from Slender Parsley-piert, the easiest way is to look at the flowers, which, when viewed from above are open and star like (as below) and narrow and closed up in Slender Parsley-piert. The next thing to examine are the stipules - those frilly "leaves" under the flowers. They are more or less equilateral triangles in the one below and in Slender, they have much longer length than width. Slender also tends to favour more acidic soils and is rarely found in obviously calcareous (chalky) areas.

Aphanes arvensis

Bladder Campion was commonly found along the road verges, though I also found Red, White and the hybrid Campion too.

Silene vulgaris

 Another field edge plant was Knotted Hedge-parsley, a small plant with Cow Parsley like leaves and tiny clumps of flowers in little umbels in the leaf nodes.

Torilis nodosa

I then went further afield and noted many plants whilst out and about with the family.

At Littlestone, I had a wander around while the family ate their fish and chips in the car as I knew there were some nice plants to see there from previous trips.

The tiny flowers of the hairy Bur Medick below. Note the coiled spikey seeds, this feature easily tells me they are not a clover, even though the leaves may look similar to one. I found these on a small patch of vegetated shingle along with Toothed Medick which is hairless, has laciniate stipules and usually strongly toothed leaflets.

Medicago minima

 Another outing was to Dover Castle and I surveyed the grounds and walls inside it while the family watched a WWII re-enactment at the Keep. An oddity I found on waste ground, but surrounded by native plants was this odd looking yellow flowered Iris. I'd not seen it before and an expert botanist online identified it for me. Since then, I've seen it in a lot of gardens, so inevitably it will get thrown out from time to time.

Iris orientalis

On and around the outer walls of the castle I found Deadly Nightshade (Atropa belladonna) and Carrot Broomrape. The former is uncommon but was too far away for any photos and the latter will be covered below.

 The next day we visited Samphire Hoe for a pleasant walk in the sunshine. Near the car park was an area full of gone to seed Early Spider Orchids, Bee Orchids and a few Common Spotteds dotted around too. However, it wasn't an orchid that was the star find of that walk, but a humble small Eyebright.

In Cornwall, the dominant Eyebright on the coastal cliffs is Western Eyebright (Euphrasia tetraquetra). I see it so often that I can recognise it instantly by its 4 sided form. Even the flowers are on 4 sides and it's usually unbranched. I took some photos of them as they looked like Western Eyebright to me, but were much larger than the Cornish plants. I expected them to be a hybrid as other Eyebright species abound in this area and they frequently hybridise with each other. However, I sent the photos to the BSBI referee and he confirmed them as Western Eyebright and that they were not hybrids. 

So what, I hear you say, they're common aren't they? Well, no they're not, at least in Kent. Until a few years ago they were considered possibly extinct until some were identified on a chalk cliff above Dover port. This was only the second record in recent times for this species, so it was a great find. Unlike the plants I see in Cornwall, these had quite long gaps between the lower leaf internodes but within tolerance for the species.

Euphrasia tetraquetra

Samphire Hoe has an abundance of flowers, but I didn't have time to record or photograph most of them. I did spot several Sea Carrot Broomrapes under the chalk cliffs at the Western end though. Lovely plants. Always take a photo of the plants around Broomrapes, it helps to know the host plant it parasitises to name it. The second photo below shows the Sea Carrot (Daucus carota subsp gummifer) that only this subsp of Broomrape attaches to.

Orobanche minor subsp maritima

From there we went to Folkestone Harbour and I was rather surprised to find Navelwort (also known as Wall Pennywort) growing on the harbour wall. It's very rare in Kent, though it seems to be spreading in recent years. Of course, it's all over the place in Cornwall where the climate is wetter.

Umbilicus rupestris

Habitat photo for Navelwort in Folkestone Harbour.

 Right next to the Navelwort was a clump of fresh Fern Grass growing out of the harbour wall. One might expect Sea Fern Grass here, but I didn't see any. Sea Fern Grass is two dimensional (flattened) and the whole plant is fleshy. You can see below that Fern Grass is three dimensional and not fleshy at all.

Catapodium rigidum

In the evenings, I would go and record the local area. I had wanted to see Grass-poly and there was a site near Betteshanger that had them along with a clover I also wanted to see. So I thought I would have a look around there. I was utterly dismayed on arrival to find the Grass-poly site was now a full scale construction site for a new housing estate. There were still paths around the building work but it was ugly and fenced in for hundreds of yards. Still, I hoped I might find something interesting, and I did.

The clover I wanted to see was still there, with fencing either side of the path, it was fortunate enough to be growing in a bare grassy patch between the fences. It was Suffocated Clover, an unusual plant which seems to lack petals and its flowers are densely crowded together in the centre of the plant. It doesn't tolerate competition from other plants, so the bare patches on this small area suited it fine. It's found from Kent to Cornwall and has mostly a Southern coastal distribution, but it's an uncommon clover.

Trifolium suffocatum

 Here's a habitat photo where this tiny plant is hanging on, threatened by development.

Wild roses abounded and the majority of them in flower were Sweetbriar Rose, with beautiful pink and white petals surrounding a golden yellow ring of anthers, with apple scented glands beneath them. Small-flowered Sweetbriars have similar flowers but much smaller in diameter and the glandular sepals reflex back strongly.

Rosa rubiginosa

As I walked this path a bit more, I found remnants of some lovely chalk turf that was outside of the building site area, so hopefully it will survive the works. In this section I found some Bee Orchids.

Ophrys apifera

 As I looked for other species, I suddenly noticed a large green spike behind the Bee Orchids and then a few more. They were Lizard Orchids about to flower. Whilst Lizard Orchids aren't that uncommon in this area, they had not been recorded here before, so another lovely find. Further down the path into the next monad and I found several more spikes, again a previously unrecorded find. Try as I might, I couldn't find one with an open flower, but they will be open a few days later that's for sure.

Himantoglossum hircinum

At the base of a slope, the path got waterlogged, though now dried out. This was the perfect habitat for Grass-poly, but none were found. It's possible there were a few there not yet flowering, but I saw nothing that looked like a Lythrum species. However, there were other species of interest, like Common Cudweed about to flower and Small-flowered Buttercups, uncommon in Kent. The lack of other plants allows me to show you its habit much more clearly than if other plants were present.

Ranunculus parviflorus

 

 Another plant that hates competition is Wall Bedstraw and I first saw some as "pavement weeds" growing out of the kerbstone cracks on the road nearby. However, in this damp area, there were lots of them and I took the time to photograph the key points to identifying this small bedstraw. It has whorls of 5-6 leaves with a mucro point and forward pointing prickles. It's usually not more than 6-8" tall and the corollas have a pink tinge to them. I only know this as I spent a lot of money investing in several volumes of Sell and Murrell which covers in detail most, if not all of the native and established alien species in the UK.

Galium parisiense

 Another poor competitor and a species usually found on the coast in damp places was Brookweed. Unfortunately, my photo of the whole plant didn't come out well, so I can only offer you its flowers.

Samolus valerandi

A couple of days later I took a walk around the Old Park Hill area of Dover which contains some chalk grassland, scrub and some woodland. It had a lovely flora and I recorded many species here.

Common Spotted Orchids were found on the bare, chalky slopes near the main road.

Dactylorhiza fuchsii

Near a recently cleared of scrub area was a big stand of Houndstongue.

Cynoglossum officinale

Common Gromwell was frequent here, a tall, many branched plant with small, creamy white flowers.

Lithospermum officinale

Field Pepperwort had previously been recorded here, so I tried to find it again. I couldn't find any at all, but a few metres away from where it had been recorded, I found a large patch of Smith's Pepperwort gone to seed.

Lepidium heterophyllum

There is only one reliable way to tell Field and Smith's Pepperwort apart and that is by examining the seed pods. Field has a very small style that doesn't exceed the groove in the pods; Smith's has longer styles that usually exceed it by 1-3mm. The photo below clearly shows the latter; so it begs the question, has Field Pepperwort died out here, or was it Smith's wrongly identified? Mistakes happen even with experienced botanists, but we'll never know without photographs or a herbarium sample. I still make plenty of mistakes 11 years into my botanical journey. I treat them as a learning opportunity for the next time I find something unusual.

Here's Smith's Pepperwort seed pods showing the long style exceeding the pod grooves.

Under the heavy shade of Beech trees, now in full leaf, some White Helleborines were flowering. However, none had opened showing the egg yolk coloured patch inside the petals. I think they either self pollinate or are pollinated by small flies that crawl through the narrow opening into the flower.

Cephalanthera damasonium

The chalk turf slopes had a lot of Quaking Grass growing on them, always a delight to see them "dancing" in the breeze, but not so easy to photograph as a result. I had to get this shot using a 1/2000th of a second exposure which means I lost depth of field, so some spikelets are blurred. This is absent from Cornwall as there is no chalk, however, we have lots of Greater Quaking Grass in the towns as a street weed and several populations of Lesser Quaking Grass in arable field edges.

Briza media

Heath Speedwell was fairly common on path sides and disturbed ground. There was a huge patch of it around a previous burn site where scrub had been cleared and burned some years before. I've also notied that this species is much bigger in its leaves and flower spikes than those found in Cornwall, so perhaps if the soil is too acidic it stunts its growth?

Veronica officinalis

In woodland above Old Park Hill were hundreds of Sanicle, all in flower. I've never seen so many in one area until now, so something there was to their liking.

Sanicula europaea

The last day of our stay coincided with a Kent Botanical Recording Group field trip, so I thought I would meet up with old acquaintances and go along. However, I left too early, so I stopped off in a rural lay-by when I saw some coppiced woodland by the road. I'm glad I did, as I found many nice species such as Common Cudweed, Trailing St. John's Wort, Heath Speedwell, Wild Strawberry and much more. Heath Cudweed was a species that had eluded me when I lived in Kent, so this was a first time seeing it for me. It wasn't yet in flower, but Cudweed flowers aren't much to look at anyway, little brown fluffy bits form the flowers!

Omalotheca sylvatica

As this blog has got rather long, I'll write a separate one for the Kent Botanical Recording Group field trip that included a prime orchid site, until then, take care and get out and about to see these lovely plants for yourself.

Dave

@Botany2021 on X (formerly Twitter)