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Sheldwich, south of Faversham, Kent - 21/10/18

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This trip came about purely by chance. The week before I was out with the family and stopped at Sheldwich church to make a cup of tea from the flask. On driving away I saw what looked like Viper's Bugloss along a road verge, but the flowers were a lot bigger. So I researched this area and found that Purple Bugloss had previously been recorded here but little else had. Thus a recording trip plan was born! My planned route took me through 4 under recorded monads. Here are the highlights from that trip. Borage was commomplace in patches for about 500m along a rural road verge. The usual blue flowers were dominant, but a few white form variants were also present. Borage Borago officinalis Common Centaury Centaurium erythraea Crreping Thistle Cirsium arvense  Two of the three usual  thistles were present. I'm sure if I had looked harder, I would have found rosettes of the third one, Marsh Thistle.

Bedgebury Forest and Rye Harbour NR - 20/10/18

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Bedgebury is home to half the species of confiers in the world, so they claim. It is clear that there is a tremendous variety of conifers here and with the autumnal colours just starting to show through, it was a good time to visit. Of course, the majority of plants/trees here are planted specimens, though I was on the look out for anything natural I  might find. Apart from a solitary Agrimony in flower, I found a nice stand of Devil's Bit Scabious in flower but that was about it! Succisa pratensis However, there wasn't much in the way of anything wild to be found. So I made the most of the planted specimens here, much the same as watching animals in a zoo! Callipcarpa japonica  Japanese Beautyberry Tree   Cotinus coggygria  Grey Smoke Bush From here we made our way to the coast for a walk at Rye nature reserve. This coastal shingle and salt marsh reserve is always worth a look around whatever the time of year. Ec