As summer seems to be here on a semi-permanent basis for a change, I felt we needed some brighter flowers to match the mood….

or even both at once….

Hey – nice idea!

I was thinking of starting a poppy field thread but didn’t have a camera when I saw one!

One of my friends has a love of poppies…

Mostly Fox gloves around the east Quantocks woods.

Soon the heathland will be colourful too.

Yeah, I reckon the next seasonal flowers thread should be heathers – It was great up on the North York Moors a couple of Augusts ago…

Zokes where is that top one?

ANyway next seasonal flower should be a woodcranesbill meadow from the Pennines, shockingly for someone who studied them for a PhD I have no pictures and I havent seen a meadow of this type in bloom for years so help me out here please.

It’s near Pendle Hill in Lancs

Are these the guys you’re after? (Other website photo, not mine)

If so, i’m sure there’s a load in the bottom of my garden. Not quite a meadow though, despite the state of my lawn!

I don’t know if I’m just noticing them more, but it seems to be an especially good year for little grassland flowers this year.

zokes,i see your butter cups and raise you a couple of million more……..

Buttercups are well and good but a true traditional meadow has soooooo much more. Thems the buggers zokes, mainly seen on roadsides these days but once were in all the upland hay meadows….

What did you do your PhD in then? Just curious as I’m currently post-doccing on nutrient cycling in nutrient-poor habitats…

Seed dispersal in pennine hay meadows (most through manure applications, ie I studied shit ( http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract;jsessionid=5346A486BB0BCE0ADD80EEA9FA359117.tomcat1?fromPage=online&aid=706060 ) then did a few years post doc on hay meadow/chalk grassland restoration

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6V5X-4M4CN74-1&_user=10&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_sort=d&_docanchor=&view=c&_searchStrId=939365678&_rerunOrigin=google&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=41a8d49d7e5ae951fdcf026c4c2a7bb1

no offence, but that sounds really boring. I’m guessing it wasnt though?

We’ve got alot of foxgloves, wild garlic, and my favourite, stinging Nettles here in the south east.

I think all PhD’s sound pretty boring to be honest. Hay meadows and chalk grasslands are the most amazing plant communities in the UK and also amongst the rarest despite having been so common 60 or so years ago.