A Botanical Journey mostly from Kent & SE England

The Botanical Society of Britain and Ireland (BSBI) run a New Year Plant Hunt over the new year period each year. The aim is to find which wild or naturalised plants are in bloom at this time of the year across Britain and Ireland then compare the results year on year. It's good fun and an excuse to get outdoors after eating too much seasonal food! More people are taking part each year and it generates positive publicity for botany from TV and the press each year, either with unusual plants found in flower or a large number in flower. Even now, most botanical books give flowering times which rarely include the end of December into early January, yet each year there are at lest 40 plants in flower, often more. See  http://bsbi.org/new-year-plant-hunt   for results from previous years. Here are my finds for the plant hunt over three days from 30/12/17 to 01/01/18 starting with Day 1.   30/12/17 - Folkestone Leas to Sandgate : in (mostly) scientific name alphabe

Form March to December I am usually out photographing and recording what I find all around Kent. It's unsurprising then that from time to time I find some rare, interesting or just beautiful wildflowers along the way. Here's just a few of the thousands I have seen and recorded this year. They are not presented in any particular order either. First up is the amazing Malling Toadflax. A visit to the West Malling area to find general records meant I had to have a look on the old town walls where this plant has been naturalised for well over 100 years. It's still there looking good. Chaenorhinum origanifolium  A new plant that I'd never seen before was Piri Piri Bur found in substantual numbers in woodland  near Mereworth. It's been previously recorded here and apparently arrived in ammunition crates from New Zealand in the second world war It's still there and attaches its clingy seeds to ones boots and socks most efficiently and annoyingly.