DAILY DIARY

With two recent finds of Sharp-leaved Fluellen (see Brian Fellows' photo of one plant at Emsworth - http://www.emsworthwildlife.hampshire.org.uk/0-0-017-sharp-leaved-fluellen-rail-n-07.08.12.jpg - and note the 'arrow-head' shaped leaves) I was beginning to think that I was not going to find the Round-leaved Fluellen which is normally easy to find in Warblington Cemetery so I headed there this afternoon and found just two plants where there are normally a dozen or more. The photos below show the difference in leaf shape.

Next stop was at the Thorney Great Deeps, west side, where I have in past years found many Pointed Snails clinging to the vegetation at this time of year. They too are in short supply this year but I did find and photo just one on the seawall a little south of the Great Deeps inlet pipes.

Another difficult to spot regular find on this seawall is Slender Hare's Ear which can be found at the inner foot of the seawall in at least two places. One is where I took the photos below, just north of the worn path coming down the bank in the Deeps inlet area. To save a long walk south there is another cluster of plants just south of the Little Deeps - go past the open water and carry on till you come the water of the 'canal' and here there is a large bramble bush on the west side of the track. The plants are to be found at the foot of the bank on the east side between the bramble bush just mentioned and a smaller bush further south on the east side.

I now rode to Prinsted and turned inland, taking the left fork at 'the square' but keeping straight ahead where the road turns north to meet the main road. Continuing along this track you come to a single bar gate leading into open fields but before going through it look at the entrance to the 'farm yard' on the north side of the track - here, just outside the low wall, a cluster of Moth Mullein plants is still in flower but won't be for much longer.

Going through the single bar gate I propped my bike against the black tin door of the shed to take photos of the Amphibious Bistort of which many of the plants were unusually in flower. Also seen here were a few plants of Shaggy Soldier growing on more or less bare concrete. Just beyond the shed there was in the past a market garden plot renowned for its arable weeds but sadly the plot has been abandoned and nothing of interest remains so I had a scout round the harvested field to the south and took the photos contrasting the leaf-shape and 'jizz' of Swinecress and the much commoner Lesser Swinecress

A warm sunny morning saw me on Portsdown in the popular Mill Lane carpark immediately west of Fort Widley where I had less than 100 metres to walk over the close mown grass to a spot near the south west corner of the Fort Widley hedge where I found my first delight of the day - a cluster of plants of Lesser Centaury growing on more or less bare chalk (see first photo below) where I used my hand lens to indicate the small size of the Centaury plants (second photo) - sadly the photo does not show the scarlet colour of the flowers (in contrast to the pinkish red of Common Centaury) but for those who are interested it does show the tiny flower stalk between the leaves and the bottom of the long calyx of the central open flower - this stalk is absent from Common Centaury in which the calyx touches the leaf.

Crossing the road I continued west along an abandoned tarmac road running parallel to the edge of the Wymering housing. Colourful wild flowers pressed in from both sides, including a Buddleia on which three fresh Brimstones and a Peacock were nectaring, and lots of Tansy. Sharing the road with me was a Southern Hawker dragonfly and a dogwalker with just one of the 101 Dalmatians. One thing that caught my eye here was some pretty pink 'candy striped' Bindweed flowers reminding my of the Hairy Bindweed (Calystegia pulchra) which Brian Fellows had introduced me to in the past at Fishbourne near Chichester. On the offchance that I had come across a Hampshire site for this plant (the Hants Flora lists it as rare and only quotes one site, at Finchdean, in south Hampshire) I took a sample flower and leaf home. They proved not to have the requisite hairy flower and leaf stalks but they did go halfway in having 'wings' to the flower stem (strangely crimped wings looking like the crimped pastry around an apple pie!).

The tarmac ended where there was access to the hillside from the Wymering estate and as I headed uphill here I was impressed by the hard work which Richard Jones puts in to provide access to the hill by mowing the extremely steep hillside track that took me up towards the hill top through a magnificent sea of wild flowers (like the wild flower meadows of the Alps in summer but better!). Next find, a single Autumn Ladies Tresses orchid, came very close to the hilltop, just acoss the James Callaghan Drive from the hilltop carpark. I noted the site as being a small area relatively clear of wildflowers on the north side of the nearest well used track to the upper fence of the compartment, and in a line from the tall street lights over the carpark to the Marriott Hotel below - I guess if you entered the compartment by the gate nearest the carpark and turned left along a track skirting the shrubs you would soon come to the spot where I marked the orchid with a square of twigs around it (the fact that these twigs were lying on the ground probably showed this was a well known site where orchids had been similarly marked in past years).

I now turned back towards Fort Widley but instead of following the broad track running parallel to the Portsdown Hill Road I found myself on the narrow chalk track parallel to the Southwick Hill Road (down towards Cosham) and, after passing the foot of four massive 'telegraph posts' carrying powerlines, this path made a sharp left turn across other tracks to bring me to the foot of a steep bare chalk uphill section at around SU 65198 06476. Here I had a choce of two uphill routes with a hummock between them - I chose the apparently less used and less steep route and it was here, at the foot of the climb, that I found the single fresh Autumn Gentian flower which I photographed and around it on the bare chalk were several more beautiful Lesser Centaury plants.

From here I re-joined the popular top path taking me back to the steps up the bank on the south side of the road down which I had come at the start of the walk - just before reaching these steps I was surprised to find a small patch of Sainfoin in fresh flower. Also in this area were several Small Blue butterflies to add to a list for the walk which included Common and Holly Blue as well as Chalkhill Blue (strangely only one of these). Newly flowering today for me, but not mentioned so far, were Carline Thistle and Ploughman's Spikenard.

A brief cycle ride today allowed me to confirm that at least two plants of Slender Hare's Ear (Bupleurum tenuissimum) had pushed up through the grass of the track below the seawall passing the west half of the South Moors.

Also seen were my first Sand Martin over the Budds Farm pools and three adult Common Gulls, with a single juvenile Black-headed, at the mouth of the Langbrook stream. Also seen on the pools were young family groups of Gadwall and Tufted Duck plus both adult Swans with all five cygnets

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This morning I headed for Havant Thicket to add these two plants to my flower list but before I came across them I am pretty sure that I had brief 'fly-bys' by both Southern Hawker and Migrant Hawker dragonflies. I also found Dwarf Gorse in full flower in several places and reflected that this is a good time for anyone unfamiliar with this species to see it before the Common Gorse resumes flowering (last year I found an early single flower on Aug 24 and general flowering started in mid-September).

Isolated plants of Lesser Skullcap can be found in several places in Havant Thicket and I have in the past found it at one spot in Stansted Forest but the site I visited this morning is the only place where it can be found en masse in the Havant area. This site is along the banks of a small stream where the ground is heavily shaded by trees with the result that there is virtually no ground flora except where the stream has created small gaps in the tree cover allowing sufficient light for this small plant to survive. For anyone wishing to find the plants the map reference is approx SU 717-103 but to get there first head for the major dip in the main vehicle track coming west from the Castle Road entrance - the dip is at SU 717-104 and is where the stream crosses under the main track. You will find it difficult to follow the stream south from this point so continue west along the track for about 100 metres to find a moderately well used path entering the wood and heading south-east towards the stream. When you reach the stream work down its banks looking for the colony of plants shown in my first photo, then search around for the one or two plants with flowers among the mass of leafy plants and you will hopefully find a few with one or two flowers as shown in my second photo.

Devils-bit Scabious is much easier to find but there seem to be fewer flowers than in past years. Of the three places where I found it today the best place to look is at SU 718-101 at the southern end of a broad track just before it reaches the Gipsies Plain.

Other newly flowering plants are the Goldenrod lining the eastern boundary track at around SU 718-108 and with it were several fresh Hieracium plants while among the mass of Ling Heather and Cross-leaved Heath flowering in the Horsefoot Hill (northern) section of the woodland both Purple Moorgrass and Tufted Hairgrass were just starting to flower

For some years I have taken a long walk at this time of year from Nutbourne around Cobnor Point to see the Marsh Mallow flowers growing under the shoreline oak wood just west of Cobnor Point and today I made this pilgrimage but before starting I had a look at the circle of Golden Rod plants growing on the north side of Farm Lane which I have now convinced myself are Early Golden Rod (Solidago gigantea) which I have never seen anywhere else. The first photo below was taken with my back to the gate into the 'wild' field which you pass as you enter the path to the Nutbourne Bay shore and should enable you to locate the large circle of golden flowers which come out earlier than the common Canadian Goldenrod, do not stand tall like the common species, and prove their identity by the almost complete absence of hairs on stem or leaves. While in the grassy area north of Farm Lane I found 30 other plants in flower including Welted Thistle but not the Narrow-leaved Ragwort that I normally see here (and which was still visible on July 5 but has now disappeared in the luxuriant growth but which will no doubt re-appear next year).

Heading down the path to the shore I saw a sign of approaching autumn in the first glimpse of Ivy flower buds (still tiny) and near the shore I saw what I am pretty sure was my first Common Darter dragonfly of the year typically resting on the bare ground before flying off at my approach.

Very few birds to be seen in the bay but before I reached the point where the 'new' path leaves the south east corner of the bay my flower list was up to 65 species and I had seen Gatekeeper, Small and Green-veined White butterflies and the bushes between the east side of the bay and the large field of wheat were crammed with House Sparrows on their annual holiday enjoying what they can of the grain harvest,

The long grassy 'new path' added Meadow Brown, Common Blue and Large White butterflies plus a single Emperor Dragonfly patrolling a substantial area of water in the ditch beside the path. Also present were many small red darter dragonflies (plus two or three mating pairs) which looked substantially smaller than the first 'Common Darter' I had seen. I managed to get a photo of one and it seemed to add weight to my feeling that these were Ruddy Darters - I think the photo shows the waisted and club tailed body of a Ruddy Darter and has the two black dashes on the final segments of the abdomen which I have seen in some photos of Ruddy Darter but not Common Darter (though it is not listed as a diagnostic). Against the view that these were Ruddy Darters my photo does not show the strong red colour of Ruddy (more the orange red of Common) although the smaller size is generally true of Ruddy...

Another feature of this path was the large number of Linnets seen along it and as we neared the Oak Wood the shore came into view and added a family of Shelduck plus lots of Black Headed Gulls, a couple of overflying Cormorants and Oystercatchers with many Curlew in the marine vegetation. Beyond them were a lot of Common Terns which looked as if they had been breeding on Stakes Island and I could hear a few Sandwich Terns in that area.

Returning to the shore the Marsh Mallow seemed to be flourishing - I saw clusters of plants both north and south of the normal area they inhabit (which is the length of the woodland) and I just took one typical photo of one stand of the plants. While in the Cobnor area I added both Red Admiral and Speckled Wood to the butterfly list and the plant list increased to 85 including fresh flowers on Tamarisk

Now heading north along the Bosham channel I added Common Sandpiper to the birds and by the time I got back to Nutbourne Bay the flower list was up to 106 species including late flowering Dyer's Greenweed and my first sight of Pepper Saxifrage with Peacock and Holly Blue added to the butterflies and a male Black-tailed Skimmer to the Dragonflies. As a bonus I had a good view of a Helophilus species hoverfly with the characteristic longitudinal black lining on its thorax and latitudinal black pattern on its abdomen.

The New Lane roadside on the way north gave me Wild Radish which I have not seen in flower for some time (in fact this seems to be my first for the year!). The stream also gave me another first in the shape of Water-plantain (the common variety, not the Narrow Leaved rarity of Emsworth's Westbrook stream!). Also seen here were Sneezewort, Red Campion, Ragged Robin and Betony.

Sadly my bike had a puncture requiring me to walk home but that brought its own reward in helping me to spot some Fumitory scrambling up the roadside vegetation. As I thought this might be Ramping Fumitory I brought home a specimen and on checking this I found the flowers were just over 1cm long, making it Common Ramping rather than Common Fumitory, but I also saw that the sepals were toothed all round their edges suggesting strongly (with other features) that this was Tall Ramping Funitory (F. bastardii) but as this is listed in the Hants Flora as 'very rare' and I have never seen it before I am reluctant to claim it (especially as I very much doubt that I could find its site again!)

The Langbrook Stream added Stream Water Crowfoot, Water Figwort and Meadowsweet to my month list and also gave me a substantial snack of the large blackberries that are now becoming ripe. Southmoor Lane gave me Knotted Hedge Parsley (though I had to look hard for it - I fear there will be none here next year) before I reached the 'waste ground' just north of Penner Road - this is always worth checking and today it gave me a single plant of Moth Mullein.

The Budds Farm pools had little of interest - the only birds present in any numbers were Coot and the Swan family almost escaped my attention though one parent and three cygnets did emerge from the thick bankside vegetation before I left. Heading along the shore towards the Hermitage stream mouth I counted 21 Swans and then following the Brockhampton Stream I heard (but did not see) a Kingfisher.

The dusty roadside of Harts Farm Way opposite the Amenity Centre still had its Annual Beard Grass but it was not easy to spot, unlike the large clump of Shasta Daisies on the roadside just west of the Hermitage stream. Up on the 'mountain' Hairy Vetchling was still easy to find (in the grassy bay north of the path running along the north side of the mountain top).

Reaching the cycleway at the foot of the A27 embankment I was pleased to see a few Pyramidal Orchids still flowering while new additions were Water Mint (in very dry surroundings) and a mass of Blue Fleabane which had totally replaced the Yellow-wort which had been dominant here on my last visit. Still present was plenty of Narrow-leaved Birdsfoot Trefoil (Lotus glaber).

Coming back along the cycleway I rode past the entrance to Broadmarsh and continued along the section beside the A27 sliproad where I came on my first Dark Mullein before crossing Harts Farm Way (White Melilot growing at the crossing point) to see that the Creeping Yellow-cress was still flourishing on the edge of the old playing fields. A surprise at the far side of the area was the blue of two flowers of Chicory flowering at ground level from plants that had been cut down.

In the Bedhampton Springs area Vervain was inevitably flowering near the Mill Pool and there was already some black fruit on the Mulberry Tree overhanging the footpath from within the Water Company land. At the point where the springs overflow into the stream I found much new growth of Himalayan Balsam as well as the expected Brooklime and Hybrid Water Speedwell.

A short evening ride to add Weasel's Snout to my month list included a visit to the Eastern Road cemetery where Caucasian Stonecrop is now flowering.

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With the tide low and the weather fine for the sunset period I cycled down to Langstone pond an hour before sunset to see if the autumn build up of the number of Egrets using it as a night roost had started. My count was 75 birds so it looks as if we are now at the start of the autumn build up which gave me a peak of 198 birds last year on Sep 14 and an all time high of 228 in the past.

At least one certain fact was recorded last night - the first flowering of Gipsywort plants at the pond edge!

This morning I took a short walk around Havant to add a few species to my August wildflower list starting with the Sticky Groundsel at the junction of East Street and Bellair Road. As this is the only site which I know of for this plant in Havant town this year I was disheartened to find that most of the plants had been killed with weed killer but luckily several plants had escaped death by hiding within the wooden fencing around an electricity transformer.

Continuing my walk down the Billy Trail I ticked Danewort, Russian Comfrey, Lesser Water Parsnip and Japanese Honeysuckle before turning onto the footpath running north to the town centre from the Royal Oak at Langstone. This path gave me Least Yellow Sorrel and the Bosmere School area gave me Small Flowered Cranesbill while Juniper Square added Yellow Flowered Strawberry.

After lunch I set out on a longer walk to Warblington and around the periphery of the farm fields. First notable observation was of the first conker lying on the ground under a tree overhanging the footbridge over the A27 and the next tick on my list was of Golden Samphire on the sea wall east of Pook Lane. In the cemetery I again failed to find Round--leaved Fluellen (for years a cert here) but I did see both Wall and Grey Field Speedwell.

Next I had a look at the marshy SSSI field east of the cemetery where Marsh Bedstraw and Square-stalked St John's Wort were found along with Water Mint, Tufted Forget-me-not, Lesser Spearwort and some late flowers on Ragged Robin. In the wetland near the sea there was a mass of Brookweed still in flower along with Wild Celery and what was either Corky-fruited or Parsley Water Dropwort. Sea Milkwort (Glaux maritima) was abundant but I saw no flowers (similarly I had earlier seen leaves but no flowers of Creeping Jenny) but I did find the first flowers on Cord Grass (Spartina).

Nothing much else of note on the east side of the farm or along the Havant Road north of the farm until I came to the A27 underpass area and saw the mass of Field Woundwort (found recently by Brian Fellows) on the north side gutter of the cycleway where it starts to slope down to go under the road. This position strongly suggested to me that the plants had arrived here as seeds with the great mass of road mending material temporarily dumped earlier this year 'uphill' of where the plants are, allowing rain to wash them down into the gutter where they can now be found.

I imagined there would be nothing else to excite me along the road into Havant but halfway along it, on the west side of the junction with the road called Meadowlands, I had the best find of the outing. I had paused to check the differences between the mass of 'Rose of Sharon' flowers planted here and the Tall Tutsan I had found yesterday and was walking on homeward past the mass of flowering Fuchsia shrubs when I looked down at the bare ground beyond the Fuchsias (where a Broom bush has been recently removed) and found that this bare ground was now covered with lots of Sharp-leaved Fluellen, all in flower.

I decided to start the month with a look at plants on Portsdown and drove to the unofficial layby immediately west of Fort Southwick for a circuit of Portchester Common and the Paulsgrove Chalkpit. Everywhere I went the number and variety of flowering plants was overwhelming and among them were two which I had never seen before - the Blue Pimpernel (photo below) and a large hybrid Tutsan which turned out to be Tall Tutsan (Hypericum x inodorum) - the latter was forcing its way up through a bramble bush in the base of the Chalkpit while the former was growing among tall grass and other plants lining the path just below the road (outside the SSSI fence) just east of the driving test centre at Fort Southwick.

As well as 106 species of flowering plants I saw 11 species of butterfly including hundreds of Chalkhill Blues plus Small and Common Blue, Brimstone and Comma plus all three Whites, Small Skipper, Gatekeeper and Meadow Brown. More unusual for me I came across four female Great Green Bush Crickets plus one Dark Bush Cricket. Birds were fewer but I did see five Swifts heading south just above my head as I parked the car on the hilltop and did hear Yellowhammer song but little else.

One of the most numerous plants today was Wild Parsnip (I love the smell of it) but more exciting were the Harebells and a couple of Clustered Bellflowers (new for the year on my list) and the Basil Thyme and Rockrose that were still flowering as was Bastard Toadflax (becoming easier to spot as its leaves turn yellower with age) - also still flowering were a few Pyramidal orchids. Seen but not yet with open flowers were Carline Thistle and Ploughman's Spikenard, and looked for but not see were Autumn Gentian and Autumn Ladies Tresses though I had no difficulty in finding Tansy in flower (smelt before seen!)

Back at home in the evening I had one further surprise - an adult Hedgehog lumbering up the garden path. I cannot recall ever seeing one here in the 55 years that I have lived here but it is very welcome and I may well see it again as the lawn is littered with slugs large and small

A short walk into Havant found two things worth a mention - one was the development of the bracket fungi on the big old Horse Chestnut tree that is nearest the loos in Havant Park (some are at the early stage at which they might be mistaken for a 'white slug' frozen to the tree trunk), the other was a collection of strange plants growing from the grass between the peripheral path and the tennis courts.

These plants, although they did not look in any way like Fiddle Dock, reminded me of finding those docks (with their distinctively shaped leaves) as I walked across the grass of the Westgate Fields in Chichester from the Westgate Leisure Centre carpark to the West Street shops (that was several years ago). Perhaps with that in mind my first thought was that these plants were perhaps young Curled Docks which had suffered from regular mowing and the zig-zag shape of their stems, growing up at 45 degees to the vertical, with many long (5cm) strap like leaves with crimped edges growing alternately up the stem and having flower bearing stems growing from their axils, supported this idea, especially as the flower bearing shoots also had many similar, but progressively smaller, crimped leaves growing from them. On these side stems each leaf axil had a whorl of three to five spherical 'flower buds', each around 1mm in diameter. The only other things that I could see at this stage were that the sinuous main stem was deeply grooved with some six deep grooves and that the lowest leaf on the sample that I brought home was 8cm long by up to 2 cm broad (still having a slightly crimped edge) and had a 2cm long leaf stem. This and the other leaves all had a mat of appressed, looped hairs covering them but only detectable with the microscope. There was no red colour anywhere on the plant to vary the universal green colouring

When I got round to examining the specimen under the microscope the flower buds were beginning to open and I could see this was no dock but was apparently a Goosefoot (all flowers similar) and I am now waiting for them to open more fully in the hopes of getting further inspiration. From what I have seen so far I cannot find a match with anything in my books ...

When writing yesterday's Weekly Summary I commented on the absence of recent reports of the large flocks of Swans that used to occur at various points in the Solent Harbours during the summer moult period, so today one of my targets was to find if the Fishbourne Channel flock still occurred - while there I could also check up on one or two special plants.

Arriving in Fishbourne I parked in Mill Close for a look at the pond in which a large colony of Mare's Tail grows giving me my first tick for the day (the only other place that I know where this grows is Aldsworth Pond where the growth of trees around the roadside pond edge makes it increasingly difficult to see anything growing in the middle of the water).

Moving on to the Fishbourne Meadows I immediately came on Square Stalked St John's Wort in the damp soil quickly followed by Marsh Ragwort. Heading south I crossed the stream and entered the first meadow from which I could see the channel which had plenty of Swans, but before going to count them I had a look at the Amphibious Bistort around my feet - usually I find one or two of the plants here are actually in flower but today they were as dull and uninteresting as they are in most places that the plants can be found so I walked on towards the water and had no difficulty in finding a mass of Dittander flowering at the fenceline. I understand that Dittander does not occur in Hampshire but there is plenty to be seen here (and where the Lavant stream enters the channel).

I now turned my attention to the Swans and my best count of them was 128 though there were probably a few more hidden behind mudbanks and vegetation. With them today were several noisy Whimbrel and both Greater and Lesser Blackback gulls - a single Common Sandpiper was also present.

After crossing the first small stream I took the long route to the Lavant, following the sea wall along two sides of a triangle and along this seawall I found several plants of Corn Parsley in flower plus my first Hoary Ragwort with its green tipped bracts. Just before the Lavant I had another first - flowers on Lesser Burdock.

On the way back I headed for Fishbourne Church to have a look at the part of the meadows which stretch towards it and in which the remains of Marsh Orchids could be seen. This route brought me alongside the stream which I had crossed when first entering the meadows and just before crossing it via a different bridge I saw what I am pretty sure from the small number of flowers in each inflorescence was Blue Water Speedwell. One final tick when I was back at the car was Lesser Hawkbit growing among the close mown roadside grass - it certainly had at least one hair growing near the base of its flower stem.

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My first notable find was the first flowering of Burnet Saxifrage in the 'wild flower' area of Havant Cemetery which had begun to flower on Portsdown on July 9 and was out in this cemetery en masse from early May last year - such are the vagaries of weather, seed germination and micro-ecology.

Having one tick spurred me to try my luck in the most unkempt part of this cemetery which is just starting to recover (thanks to the Conservation Volunteers once known as the BTCV) from years of neglect. Masses of bramble and overgrown shrubbery have been cleared but the paths which had been opened up have disappeared under exuberant growth of grasses which is ideal for my target species here - the lovely Argiope bruenicchi which I call the Golden Orb spider but which is popularly known as the Wasp Spider despite being totally inoffensive to humans (though not to Grasshoppers).

This zigzag structure is known as a 'stabilmentum' and clearly serves some purpose in strengthening the web's ability to resist destruction when it is hit by a large flying grasshopper but as far as I am concerned it is an excellent indicator of the presence of the spider. The vibrations from my footfalls as I approach the web usually make the spider 'disappear' (she drops from the web to the ground below where she is difficult to spot) but the zigzag of the web is a 'dead giveaway'!

Two other points of interest in this walk concerned colour abberation in flowers and the impact of climate change of flowering seasons. The first point was raised when in Havant Bus Station where, for several years, a tiny plot of unconcreted land in the corner west of the station building has produced a summer long flowering of Hedgerow Cranesbill in which all the flowers are white. Maybe the genetic modification was caused by a fuel spill or exposure to diesel fumes but it is now firmly established here (and maybe will be spread by the buses or their passengers inadvertently carrying seeds). When on Hayling beach recently I found tiny plants of Dove's Foot Cranesbill that had all white flowers (an effect of salt or of diesel pollution carried by ocean currents!!). Before trying to establish a connection between white flowers and dirty black diesel I was reminded this week by Brian Fellows of the long established susceptibility of both Creeping and Marsh Thistles to a white-flower gene.

The ability of climate change to influence flowering seasons is more obvious. Many years ago when working at the IBM HQ in Portsmouth I became aware of a few Hawthorn trees which, like the famous Glastonbury Thorn, flowered around Christmas, well ahead of their fellows, and since then I have learnt to keep an eye out for particular Hazel and Goat Willow Trees which also blossom a month or more earlier than others around them. One theory to account for this was that the trees had been planted by local councils which had found they could save money by purchasing the saplings from continental sources to the south of our latitude and that these trees had biological clocks set to expect spring earlier than the norm for Britsh latitudes...

Today's observation was that the 'Giant Herb Robert' growing on an alley wall off East St in Havant (and thought to be a species native to the Canary Islands) has clearly now reached the end of its flowering season which started before Christmas last year.

Having seen Slender Hare's Ear well developed on Hayling during Wednesday's outing I thought I would check on the Thorney Island site this afternoon so I put on a brave face before cycling through the Traveller's Camp occupying the A27 underpass area of the Havant to Emsworth main road - with great relief I found that the Travellers had left, and what's more there was no rubbish left. There were vehicle ruts in the roadside grass, but no serious damage to the site (in fact the ruts might have the effect of 'ploughing' the soil and cause new plants to germinate). At the slip-road end of the site there was already one addition to the plant list, though the plants had put up leaves before the Travellers arrived, and this was Upright Hedge Parsley, now in flower.

On Thorney Island I failed to find either Slender Hare's Ear or Pointed Snails, but I did find my first Sea Aster flowers and recognized the Spiny Restharrow plants for what they were.

On the way home I made a detour up Lumley Lane and was rewarded with fresh flowers on three Skullcap plants growing on the brickwork of the stream wall outside cottage number 3.

After yesterday's exhausting outing I stayed at home until the cool of the evening when I cycled to Broadmarsh in search of my first Creeping Yellow Cress flowers which I had no difficulty in finding after riding west along Hart's Farm Way to the point at which it reaches the complex A27/A3M interchange. Stopping here I used the pedestrian crossing route to get to the old Broadmarsh playing fields, finding lots of the Yellow Cress flowering on my left, not much more than a yard back from the road edge.

From here I cycled back along Harts Farm Way to the entrance to the Amenity Tip where I crossed road to the cycleway on the south side of the road. Crossing at this point brings you to the closed vehicle entrance to a compound marked 'Conroys' and here, on the south side of the cycle track starting from the Conroy's entrance and running east almost to the Electricity Substation, was a mass of an unusual grass (photos below).

When I got home I realised this grass (of which I had brought home a sample stem) could not be a form of Bristle Grass (my initial thought) as the books say that all species of Bristle Grass have a ring of hairs around the stem where the leaf blade diverges from the stem and this had a more normal membranous narrow, pointed ligule about 3 mm long.

This ligule exactly matched the size and shape of the ligule illustrated in C E Hubbard's "Grasses" for Annual Beard Grass, a rare plant of the saltmarshes which I have never found before and at the moment I am thinking that that is what I have found (though waiting for the botanists to tell me I am wrong!)

Before coming home I visited the top of the Broadmarsh 'mountain' to see that at least some plants of the Hairy Vetchling have survived the horse grazing and are still flowering. Also, when passing the entrance to the Langstone Technology Park's north carpark, I had a look for the 'Mount Etna Ragwort' plants of which there had been a couple of dozen when I was last here. Today I could only see one (but with no signs of the area having been mown so I assume someone thought they were 'saving the planet' by manually pulling up the plants) so I pulled that up to make another, probably vain. attempt to 'press and preserve it' for expert examination (I am preserving lots of seed from my previous attampt at pressing when I left the plant too long before pressing and it was rigid before I could press it!)

Today I spent five hours in hot sunshine plant hunting on Hayling Island during which my forearms changed colour from pale white to bright red. The three main sites which I visited each had their prizes - on the Saltmarsh Lane shore I found a good show of Slender Hare's Ear (full grown but with no sign of flowers yet) and a colony of Dyer's Greenweed which I don't recall having found here before; on the Sinah shore south of the Golf Course I managed to find Little Robin in flower and saw Six Belted Clearwing moths being attracted to pheremones; best of all, just east of the Beachlands Skatepark, I found a colony of at least 50 Proliferous Pink plants in flower; and finally I visited the Black Point Sailing Club and saw a mass of Sea Holly in flower.

Reaching the Saltmarsh Lane area I turned right from the Coastal Path along the track to the sea wall, stopping where the track narrows and curves to slope up onto the seawall. Walking back some 15 paces from this final bend to the last of the broad, rutted sections of track which were still showing signs of heavy rain with water in the ruts, I found the ruts were fringed with the distinctively shaped Fern Grass whose latin name (Catapodium rigidum) descripes the ungrasslike rigidity of its fernlike inflorescence. Turning from the central rut to the higher ground on the inside edge of the track here I found among the taller, untrodden grasses, the unmistakeble wiry shapes of Slender Hare's Ear plants - no sign of flowers yet but there should soon be a good show on the plants here. Across the track on the 'marsh' side there were plenty of unmissable yellow flowers on Dyer's Greenweed and there was even one touch of yellow on the seawall from a late flowering specimen of the Bastard Cabbage which, a few weeks ago, clothed the whole of this seawall with yellow.

Reaching the Ferry Road along the north of the Golf Course I stopped to double check an unexpected late flowering plant of Wintercress (out of the corner of my eye I had thought it might be Creeping Yellow Cress which I have not yet seen). In this area I watched a Buzzard soaring over Sinah Warren and a Jay disappearing into trees from which I heard the song of Robin, Blackcap and Whitethroat plus some churring which might just have been from a Dartford Warbler.

Reaching the sandy grassland south of the Golf Course I kept on the southern most grass track, stopping to park my bike against a red lifebuoy container when I thought I was in the area where a recent survey by the Hayling Coastal Conservation Group had found Little Robin. Using the 'lifebuoy' as a focus I set out on a circuit of the areas of bare shingle surrounded by other vegetation which looked like possible sites for Little Robin and as I walked I kept on eye on a man 'behaving strangely' on the more grassy areas - he would stand still for several minutes, intently watching something on the ground at his feet, then walking 20 yards or so to repeat the process. When we eventually met up there was mutual recognition as this was John Phillips, who with George Else is one of the two nationally recognised insect experts living in Northney on Hayling. John was doing something which I have often heard of but never seen in practice, using chemical pheremones to attract and catch Clearwing Moths, in this case Six-belted Clearwings which are illustrated and described at http://ukmoths.org.uk/show.php?id=1550 (if you just but 'Clearwing' into the search panel at the head of each UK Moths website page you will see that there are 10 Clearwing species to be found in Britain). Having bought a bottle of the chemical pheromone from a lepidopterist shop John put a drop of it on a rag attached to the top of a short wooden peg which he stuck in the gound to support the rag (giving off the scent that would naturally be given off by a fertile female Clearwing) and then waited for a male Clearwing to show up - he got at least two today.

After a long chat I offered to show John the site where Nottingham Catchfly grows near the Golf Course fence (apparently this plant is the food plant of an uncommon moth which John may wish to track down in the future) and as I walked back to collect my bike what should I find but two plants of the elusive Little Robin, each having flowers showing the bright yellow pollen on their anthers which is a strong proof of the plant's identity. Back with John we walked north over the grass and I was able to show show John another of the botanic curiosities of this area - a healthy growth of Polypody Fern growing, not from the damp branches of a woodland Oak but straight up from the dry sand under the grass here

Moving east past the Inn on the Beach and the Beachlands Skatepark I stopped in the grass parking bay on the north side of the Beachlands road. Here, starting from the metal pole supporting the Pay and Display and the No Fires notices, I walked north towards the young Holm Oak which is slightly right of the two Macrocarpa trees which frame the view of the reddish tiles on the wall of the west most house along the south side of Seafront Road. Three paces before being stopped by a wall of sand my route brought me to some longer grass containing many yellow Cats Ear flowers and a close view of the patch showed me that it also contained around 50 tiny pink flowers (each approx 5mm across) standing almost as tall as the Cats Ear on wire thin stalks. At the top of each stalk there could be a single flower or a cluster of up to three but with only one currently in flower. These are the rare Proliferous Pink flowers which were only discovered within the past 20 years (and were at first thought to be another colony of the equally rare Childing Pinks that can be found on the Sussex coast) and their rarity can be measured by the fact that Stace's Flora only knows of them at two sites - one in Bedfordshire and the other in Norfolk. Having no ability to control the focussing of my camera on small objects such as these flowers I can only apologise for the photos below and hope they give you an impression which, with my text, enables you to see the flowers and enjoy a focussed image!

Next stop was at the Black Point Sailing Club where the only plant showing among the mass of parked cars was a good show of Sea Holly already in flower

Before reaching the Gipsies Plain I came across my first Sneezewort and took a couple of snaps to show that its leaves and flowers are easily distinguished from the Yarrow for which the plant could be mistaken at a casual glance. Among the many flowers seen along the 'orchid ditch' track as I turned south towards the woodland were my first Betony (later seen in three or four other places) and my first Red Bartsia. After climbing the metal gate onto the track leading in to Hammonds Land Coppice I enjoyed the Marsh Woundwort which John Goodspeed had seen on July 12 and then crossed the track to confirm that the Yellow Loosestrife growing there was the wild species (and not the garden Dotted Loosestrife). To distinguish between the two you have to look at the calyx under the flower - in Dotted Loosestrife this is all green, in Yellow Loosestrife the green has a clear orange edge. To my surprise the plants here were Dotted but there was plenty of the Yellow form when I reached the Thicket Lawn (photo of the calyx taken there is inserted below.

I had hoped to see Silver Washed Fritillaries in Hammonds Land Coppice but had to wait till later (in the Long Avenue) to see just one - however I had a less expected sighting of a glorious Clouded Yellow here to bring my butterfly species count for the morning to 10 (nothing else unexpected but the list did include my personal first Ringlets). One other unexpected sighting in the woodland near the lake was a very young Slow-worm and in the Leigh Park Gardens I was surprised by the continuous song of a single Song Thrush.

After the muddy track under the trees of the Long Avenue I was glad to reach the dry ground along the southern fringe of Havant Thicket and here I came on just two tiny bushes of flowering Dwarf Gorse that I had hoped to see today and I will end with a photo to prove the find.

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A two hour walk around the Langstone area in warm sunshine and with little wind this morning gave me a list of 139 flowering plant species plus five butterflys and seven birds still singing. With the tide high and the water calm the sea was almost devoid of bird life but Langstone Pond had its Swan Family complete with six cygnets briefly back, a Reed Warbler still singing and 39 or more Egrets sitting out the high tide along with several Grey Herons.

Newly flowering plants on land included my first Stone Parsley, Japanese Spindle, and Mugwort (you can tell when it starts to flower as the flower heads lose the bright white sheen of the buds and become dull as they open their brown petalled flowers). Of more interest to me was the summer outburst of shoreline flowers - just one first flower of Golden Samphire and a few flowers on the totally unrelated Rock Samphire plus the easily ignored flowers of Sea Purslane, Sea Beet, and Grass Leaved Orache but also with my first find of Sea Lavender (surprisingly I saw Lax Sea Lavender much earlier on July 2.

Coming back from Budds Farm (no special bird interest) up Southmoor Lane I was pleased to find a substantial patch of Knotted Hedge Parsley (small plants as a result of regular mowing but nevertheless bearing flowers) in grass around the foot of the second lampost south of the Harts Farm Way roundaboubt on the east side of the road near the last of several boards advertising Lewmar Marine workshops and the only board for the Guinness offices supervising council housing in Havant.

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With the rain not scheduled to start until after lunch I set off early for Hayling Island (and got home just before the rain around 1:30 pm). Nothing special in the way of first flowerings (though I did see my first Sand Spurrey, Rough Clover, Pale Toadflax and Cocks Eggs) but there was a real feeling that summer is here in the abundance of plant growth and the variety of flower colour, not to mention the sight of young Swallows perching on the Sinah Golf Gorse fence and my almost treading on a very newly fledged Meadow Pipit on the shingle.

Nothing much of special interest until I reached the Gorse on the north side of the Sinah Golf Course. Here I cycled to the west most of the wooden pathside seats (just before you are forced to re-emerge onto the Ferry Road), propped my bike against the seat, and walked back to the previous wooden seat - in this fairly short stretch I found more than a dozen tiny pinkish flowers of Sand Spurrey which could be distinguished, in the absence of obvious Cranesbill leaves, from the similar sized and coloured Dove's Foot Cranesbill flowers by a quick look at their stems - Cranesbill flowers are supported by leafless petioles and stems, the Spurreys by stems densely clothed with whorls of tiny swordlike, upward pointing leaves.

Reaching the Kench I took some photos of the Bladder Senna bush in flower half way along the eastern side and then returned to the Ferry Road, passing the patch of Bell Heather in the Golf Course before stopping to check out some Evening Primrose flowers having recently been reminded that the commonest species round here is not 'Common' but 'Large Flowered' and noticing that these roadside plants were much smaller than others which I have seen. A quick look at the flowers showed me that the female styles protruded much further than the male stamens which is only true of the Large Flowered species - I could also see that the reason for the small size of the plants was that the original single tall plants stems had been cut down, forcing the plants to put up a number of shorter stems in order to bear the flowers. While looking at this obvious flower I noticed a much less obvious one nestling in the grass of the sandy roadside soil - the tiny white flowers of Rough Clover, the first I have seen this year. A small wild rose bush growing nearby in the Golf Course fenceline had flowers of a pink tinge that suggested Sweetbriar and the smell of apples from the crushed leaves confirmed this.

Heading east towards the toile block north of the Inn on the Beach, I stopped at the south east corner of the mini-golf course to photograph the Pale Toadflax which has just started to open its flowers under the gorsebushes for this year's show. While doing this I found members of the Hayling Coastal Conservation Group, a local group associated with the national Conservation Volunteers (new name of BTCV), who were carrying out a survey of how well an area near the Toilets, which had in the past been used for car parking, was recovering to natural habitat. I was not aware of this new group and if there is anyone else wishing to promote the flourishing of natural wildlife habitat, and to join in activities on the second Thursday and/or fourth Saturday of each month, they have only to make themselves know by email to haylingccg@virginmedia.com (or contact www.facebook.com/HaylingCoastal) to receive an enthusiastic welcome plus free tea and biscuits during their work sessions.

The rain was now threatening but before heading home I took a couple more photos of the unusual plants called Cocks Eggs (getting this name from the white, egg shaped flowers and being members of the Nightshade family) and which have just started to flower this year - they have been flourishing for many years on the common immediately south of Staunton Avenue (along the fence line of the westmost house on the south side of the Seaside Road).

Back in Langstone I made a quick check of the Egret nests at Langstone Pond and found well grown youngsters still in or near six of the nests

A two-part walk on Portsdown today gave me 111 flowering plant species and my first Great Green Bush Cricket (albeit not full grown) with lots of Marbled White butterflies.

I started from the carpark east of the London Road where a little Sainfoin was still in flower with plenty of Squinancywort that was new to my list though it has been flowering for a couple of weeks. Before crossing the southbound sliproad I enjoyed a tall stand of Evening Primroses (but failed to check for red hairs or stamen/style length!) and as I crossed the road a Buzzard was seen over the Candy Pit trees. On the slope down to the London Road I found a cluster of Hieracia ('difficult to name' yellow daisies though these had the black spotted leaves of Spotted Hawkweed - Hieracium maculatum).

Crossing the bridge over the London road I noticed that Tansy flowers were getting near showing their yellow colour, but when I reached the northbound sliproad I was very pleased to see a good show of Sickle Medick flowering next to the road salt bin (painted a matching yellow!). Returning to the carpark I found a less exciting first for the year Burnet Saxifrage.

My next stop was at the unofficial parking area immediately west of Fort Southwick from which I set off towards Portchester Common but very soon found a mass of Upright Hedge Parsley, the last of the three Cow Parsley look-alikes. Pushing on through dense untrodden vegetation south of the hilltop barley field a slight movement of the greenery close to me gave me a sight I have not seen for several years - a Great Green Bush Cricket (not a full grown monster but still in a league of its own among the other Orthoptera now filling the grass and shrubs).

Reaching the top gate into Portchester Common I turned uphill to walk west along the highest section where I had no difficulty in finding my main target - the lovely Basil Thyme which seems to be having a good year (normally I only find it sparsely scattered, growing from bare earth around the edges of scrapes made by Rabbits, but today it was widespread and competing with the many other plants in the downland turf - after finding it in the top section I found more, plus my first flowering Marjoram, as I moved downhill towards the lower gate by which I left the common.

Heading east down to the foot of the hill below the Driving Test centre there were lots more Marbled Whites and a few Meadow Brown but the only other butterfly seen was a single Small Skipper (revealing its identity in flight by its bright orange colour). Another insect of which I found several here was Dark Bush Cricket before the next burst of bright colour from the Rock Rose colony. Another bright colour well distributed in this area was that of the Musk Thistles.

Reaching the electricty pylon where my path turned uphill again I did not expect any new finds on the way up but about half way through the climb I spotted Yellow-wort (a member of the Gentian family) and realised I had not got it on my list - not a significant addition on its own but as I paused to write GTYW on my pad I found I was looking at some tiny white star-shaped flowers with a distinctive yellow-green foliage and so was able to add the more significant SWBT (for Sandalwood family, Bastard Toadflax) which I had not previously found in this section of the hill (immediately west of the Paulsgrove Chalkpit (Richard Jones' Compartment 2). That was my last notable find of this trip.

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With the sun shining warmly and the wind light I cycled east to Nutbourne, then north via Hambrook over the A27 to Marlpit Lane from which I came home along the Funtington Road and then through north Emsworth. New plants for the year were Long-stalked Cranesbill, Moth Mullein, Welted Thistle, Vervain, Old Man's Beard and Wild Basil plus a couple already seen by others but new to me (Rosebay Willowherb and Wood Sage). I also had a couple of personal insect firsts (Marbled White butterfly, Southern Hawker dragonfly and a mating pair of what I think were Black-tailed Skimmers) and my first Common Sandpiper of the autumn.

First stop was on the Thorney 'Wickor Bank' sea wall by the Little and Great Deeps, the latter being where I saw the Common Sandpiper among many Redshank and Oystercatcher flying in for refuge from the top of the spring tide. Also flying in high (and with their backs to me) were were some bulky birds which I could not at first identify until a few changed direction enough for me to see white on their breasts and wings and to realise they were Shelduck - at least 70 heading for the far end of the Deeps in addition to nine already on the water near me. On the Little Deeps I only saw Mallard and Coot but as I cycled on down to the Great Deeps I passed the Southern Hawker and my first Marbled White plus Gatekeeper, Meadow Brown, Large and Small White. On the bank at the Great Deeps I found just one young Pointed Snail (had the weather been hotter and the vegetation thinner I would no doubt have seen more).

One spike of flowering Vervain confonted me as soon as I got onto the ERA track heading east - near it was a lone Pyramidal orchid and back on the Wickor Bank I had noted a single plant of Prickly Lettuce already in flower.

At Farm Lane in Nutbourne the Narrow-leaved Ragwort was flowering as it has for several years - to find it head west along Farm Lane past the track to the shore and look in the edge of the dense vegatation on the north side of the road - you should see the bright yellow flowers among the brambles shortly before you reach the point where the 'Ham Brook' stream runs under Farm Lane into the 'Conservation Area' field. I brought back a small sample to contrast the almost linear leaves of this species which the complex pattern of what I am calling the 'Mount Etna Ragwort' that is growing this year in Havant at the western entrance to the north carpark of the Langstone Technology Park.

Nothing of much significance until I reached the waste land (old pits) east of Marlpit Lane where I started off along the main track leading east from the northern vehicle gate (close to the footpath entrance), immediately finding myself among a mass of Welted Thistles, Vipers Bugloss, Common Comfrey and many other plants which were already on my list (though I did stop here to add the Welted Thistle and the Old Man's Beard which I had found in flower for the first time on the hedge lining the west side of Marlpit Lane before entering the site).

My own route was longer than it need have been and I would recommend any one heading for the area where the Long-stalked Cranesbill grows to turn off the broad easterly track at the first opportunity onto an equally broad track heading south and then uphill in a long left had curve. When this track ceases to go uphill look ahead and to your right for the first of a line of fence posts supporting a barbed wire fence (they may not be easy to spot among the vegetation) running east away from you, and south of which I had been told to look for the Cranesbill which is where I found my first plant.

This plant had a single flower stem 3cm long and while trying to position the flower for a photo it came off in my hand, hence the separation of the photos of plant and flower! Next to what I thought might be the only plant I would find I came on two plants of Moth Mullein (and managed to photograph the flowers of this in my shade but leaving the background to the flowers in full sunlight!). Also in this area I found Rosebay Willowherb, Wood Sage and Wild Basil while a Buzzard glided by against the background trees. Later I found the Cranesbill flowers in at least four places so it is well worth searching around.

A short walk around Havant this morning found lots of Mousear Hawkweed flowering on the South Street frontage of St Faith's churchyard (along with Green Field Speedwell) and later, in the garden of the single house on the west side of Havant Park, I found lots more Borage among a mass of wild flowers presumably sown by Havant Borough.

In the afternoon, during a break in the rain, I cycled to the far side of Emsworth, up Lumley Lane to Westbourne and back via Southleigh Road. A brief stop at the 'Emsworth Wayside' side east of the Warblington underpass found Common Centaury coming into flower but more excitingly my first Gatekeeper butterfly of the year. Last year these were being reported from the beginning of June but I have not seen them reported anywhere so far this year.

Coming out of Westbourne I passed the first flowers on the huge Cotton Thistle in a garden on the north side of Westbourne Road just after the road turns west and crosses the River Ems (the river is not visible from the road)

First the correction - I did not find Corn Spurrey yesterday, it was Lesser Stitchwort but found in an unusual situation and apparently having no stem leaves. I looked at my specimen under a microscope and carefully noted details including the presence of 5 deeply cut petals, 10 stamens and 3 stigmas, then checked with, but did not act on, Stace who clearly says that Spurreys have five 'entire', not split, petals; 5 to 10 stamens; and 5 stigmas.

Today I walked north to the New Lane allotments and added the Weasels Snout and, in the cemetery, Duke of Argyle's Teaplant to my July list, en route passing my first Redshank flowers for the year, and came back via Havant Park where I confirmed that plants seen last week, but only from across the busy road passing the Bus Station, were Borage, and while there I found both Brooklime and Greater Willowherb flowering in the concrete channel of the Lavant stream before it becomes (in my book) the Langbrook on the west side of Park Road.

Two other species that got a tick on my year list (both ticks were of dubious integrity!) were Prickly Lettuce - among a cluster of plants having flower buds one had I think been sprayed with weed killer, turning most of its leaves yellow and forcing it into early flowering before it died an early death. The other plant was Caucasian Stonecrop which was starting to flower in an obvious garden situation but as I have the species on my 'wild flower' list through its established presence on a cemetery grave where it does not appear to have been tended for more than 20 years, I recorded that the flowering period for the species has arrived. Another species of which I found half a dozen plants in flower for the first time since February was Fool's Parsley - I see Brian Fellows found the species in bud at Emsworth yesterday

Despite the continuous light rain the advent of a new month got me out for a walk to Langstone during which I came across eight newly flowering plants for the year, the best and most appropriate of which was Meadow Sweet beside the Langbrook Stream. Also newly flowering in the stream was Fool's Water Cress with its small clusters of flowers shyly hiding in the stem joints. Another wetland plant was the massive Water Dock growing in Langstone Pond and near it, just below the seawall, Lax Sea Lavender was flowering (beside it was the first washed up Cuttlefish bone of the summer). Another significant newcomer seen in Havant was Enchanter's Nightshade (not a Nightshade but a member of the Willowherb family of which my garden had this year's first flowering Short-fruited Willowherb - the first specimen of which had been found last week in Brook Meadow at Emsworth).

An unexpected find in disturbed soil by the eastbound approach road to the Langstone roundabout was Corn Spurrey and near it Common Orache was starting to flower. An uninteresting first flower in Havant was Greater Plantain and a surprise find in Juniper Square was red strawberry fruit on the Yellow-flowered Strawberries. Returning to the Billy Trail from Wade Court Road at the end of my walk I found white flower umbels (no flowers yet open) on the Danewort and among the trees here a Spindle was bearing a good crop of fruit though still green in colour.

Wren and Dunnock (but not Robin) were still singing as were Blackbird and Song Thrush plus the inevitable Wood Pigeon and Collared Dove with Reed Warbler at Langstone Pond. At Grove Road I noticed Royal Fern (definitely planted!) was flowering and that Herring Gulls were claiming possession of house rooves and at Langstone, with the tide high, there were some 30 Egrets roosting in the trees with at least four nests still occupied. Coming up Wade Lane I found a cluster of toadstools on the earth bank of the sunken section of the lane - they were past their best and I could not be sure of their identity but thought they were Agaricus bitorquis.

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Before reaching the Common I ticked three new flowers for the year - Hedge Bedstraw by the bridge, Sea Lavender on the Northney Bridge saltings, and Wild Celery in the roadside ditches after passing the Hotel entrance. Also on the bridge I noticed that, in the area under the railings where all vegetation had earlier in the season been sprayed with weedkiller, young plants are starting to grow back, gving me hope that the plant of Dwarf Mallow which I saw flowering there on Aug 19 last year may re-appear and may actually benefit from elimination of other competing growth.

Reaching North Common I was surprised to see no hint of the Goat's Rue which normally grows there but I did see and photograph the two large and healthy Fragrant Agrimony plants which have appeared there annually since at least 2005. Although it is too early to check the distinctive way in which the spines of the burrs (seed capsules) turn back on themselves I had a good sniff of the fragrance which comes from the young leaves.

Finally something I noticed in my garden on Sunday morning but forgot to mention - the appearance of the first Blackening Waxcap toadstool in my lawn.

This morning, in warm sunshine, I cycled from Havant to Great Salterns Quay halfway down the west shore of Langstone Harbour where my target was the colony of Small Melilot seen by John Norton on May 30 but apparently known there since 2000. I had no difficulty in finding the Melilot but passed many other interesting plants as I cycled along the continuous cycleway from Havant to this site.

In Havant the 'Etna Ragwort' had fully opened its first flowers and across the road from the recycling site there was a selection of different coloured cultivars of Opium Poppy (perhaps from seed blown across the road from garden waste?) and amongst them lots of Sun Spurge, but the main interest began when I reached the section of cycleway below the A27.

Here the cluster of 20 or more Bee Orchids seen on May 28 had shrunk to a couple of miserable specimens but had been replaced by the best part of 200 Pyramidal orchids and my first Common Centaury with lots of Yellow Wort. Less conspicuous, but catching my eye, was what seemed to be a weedy specimen of Bird's Foot Trefoil but which, on close inspection, turned out to be my first Narrow-leaved Bird's Foot Trefoil of the year - the photo below shows the wiry stems, thin leaves, reduced number of flowers and (if you look carefully) the convergent sepal points on the top of the flower - which in this picture is pointing downward to show this feature in the photo.

The approach road to the reserve had a plethora of flowers including Musk Mallow, Pale Flax, Common Poppies, Small Scabious and Scentless Mayweed but the one I was looking for was the Fodder Vetch which John Norton found here last week (June 19).

Heading on beside the busy Easten Road into Portsmouth I turned into the car entrance to the Great Salterns area and immediately found the Small Melilot site in a bare gravel patch running south from the point at which vehicles turn north into the parking area. My photo including a ruler shows the very small size of these plant which could not be confused with the common Ribbed or Tall Melilot.

Heading homeward I ticked off my first Bristly Oxtongue for the year and back in Havant (outside the Park Road South exit from Bosmere school) the regular colony of Black Horehound was out for the first time.

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First area of botanic interest was what I call the 'orchid ditch' running south from the east-west main track across the open plain to the track running along the south of the plain, meeting it where it enters Hammonds Land Coppice. In the past I have found up to 200 Common Spotted Orchids here - today there were still 50 but there was still plenty of other interest including Field and Burnet Roses, Yellow Loosestrife, Marsh Bedstraw, etc

Back on the east-west track I came to a large patch of Heath Speedwell (which seems to be having a good year) and near it a single tiny yellow star shaped flower on a wiry stemmed plant hidden in the short grass - at the time I couldn't name it but thought I was just having a 'senior moment' and that the name would soon come to mind. Back at home the only plant of similar size, habit, colour seems to be Trailing St John's Wort though I have never before come across that in open grassland, nor recorded it as the first Hypericum species of the year (later in this walk I found H. pulchrum - Slender SJW - usually the first to show) just starting to flower.

Crossing through the long avenue of trees I emerged into the Deerslaughter side just as a Buzzard was approaching the trees from the west and I watched it settle into a favourite treetop perch. The grassland this side added Meadow Browns and Small Heaths to the Common Blue seen earlier though I had to wait till I was on the Yellow Brick Road for a lovely trio of male Brimstones, my first Large Skipper, a Holly Blue and the omnipresent Red Admiral.

I checked the Willow lined stream north of the main avenue for flowers on the mass of Marsh Pennywort that grows there but as usual failed to see any.

In the Havant Thicket woodland trackside flowers included my first Greater Birds-foot Trefoil and a new showing of Grass Vetchling plus the first hint of colour in the flower buds on Hemp Agrimony. From the trees I heard the lovely song of a Willow Warbler, the piping of a Bullfinch and the more mundane song of a Coal Tit.

Back at the car I was about to drive off when I noticed a passenger on the windscreen - a Longhorn beetle which I have not yet been able to name despite searching the internet. Superficially it looks a bit like a Wasp Beetle but has a much reduced pattern on its elytra and they are channelled into grooves. It was very happy for me to move it from the windscreen onto the bark of a nearby tree

Back in Havant the first flower was open on a self sown roadside Greater Mullein plant

This morning a walk to the shops gave me the first flowering Buddleia bush and a Potato plant flowering in the town centre (behind the Robin Hood pub)

After lunch I got on my bike and cycled to Gunner Point on south Hayling adding 12 new for the year wild flowers, the first being Blue Fleabane in the Langstone Sailing Club land at the north end of Langstone Bridge.

In the Oysterbeds area I saw some half dozen well grown Black-headed Gull chicks not yet ready to fly off on their own, and on the earth-mound at least five Milk Thistle plants were newly in flower but there was no sign of flowers on the Goats Rue in the carpark area.

Not far south on the Stoke Bay seawall the first Musk Mallow was in full flower and Rosebay Willowherb was showing the colour of its flowers though none of them were yet open. Just past the bay, by the pond on the landward side of the track, a mass of Dyers Greenweed was in flower (John Goodspeed had been the first to see this on Thorney Island on June 14)

Nothing more in the way of flowers till I reached Sinah Common on which Bell Heather was in flower, and at the Kench the Bladder Senna was in flower. Also on the shore of the Kench the first of many flowering bushes of Tree Lupin were in full flower while the roundabout near the Ferry Inn gave me Hare's Foot Clover in flower.

After rounding the sand dunes to reach the Pill Box by the Golf Course fence I began to see the start of a mass of Sheepsbit (I have never seen so much of this turning the sandy soil into a lookalike for the Bluebell wood!). The Green-winged orchids are now over but near the centre of their empire I had no difficulty in finding Nottingham Catchfly in flower (probably less than 20 stems so less than previous years). Here and elsewhere more than usual of the lovely Rose Campion flowers were starting to open. Also in this area I saw plenty of the Sea Bindweed that I was hoping for.

In the area south of Staunton Avenue I failed to find any of the Proliferous Pink plants but I did find my first Sticky Groundsel flowers

Cycling back up the Coastal Path I realised that many of the Wild Rose bushes I was passing had pure white flowers and it eventually occurred to me that they were probably the first Field Roses of the year though I do not get a chance to check one out.

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Last Saturday the Havant Wildlife Group had a long walk on Portsdown during which they found Yellow-wort and Meadow Vetchling in flower and also on Saturday the first Meadow Brown and Marbled White butterflies were seen in Sussex giving me hopes of seeing all these and more on Portsdown today.

I parked in the first layby on James Callaghan Drive west of the hilltop roundabout and walked west along the top of the south face of the hill to the west end of the Chalk Pit, then came back via the base of the chalk pit before returning to the hill top and returning to car by different paths. My flowering plant count today was 80 species, among which were Meadow Vetchling and Yellow-wort plus Bastard Toadflax (first seen at Brighton on May 27) and the first flowers I am aware of on Musk Thistle, Lucerne, Black Bryony, Greater Knapweed and Eyebright. Other species new to me this year were Yellow Vetchling (Lathyrus aphaca), Pyramidal Orchid, Tufted Vetch, and Thyme-leaved Sandwort (abundant).

Only three butterfly species were seen (Common Blue, Small Blue and Red Admiral ) - no Marbled White but I did later see my first Meadow Brown of the year at Skew Road above Portchester. Before moving there I chanced to see a Dark Bush Cricket nymph with a Grasshopper nymph.

At Skew Road the Field Cow-wheat was just coming into flower (many plants had rich purple plumes but only one showed the gold flecks which come with full flowering). Across the road on the Nelson Lane side the first Straw Foxgloves (Digitalis lutea) had just started to flower and across Nelson Lane from them on the motorway side there was a new to me colony of what seemed to be the yellow form Ivy Broomrape that grows south of the motorway in the Red Barn estate.

After yesterdays torrential downpour this morning was dull but relatively dry and windless allowing me to spend an hour walking round Havant, starting with a visit to Havant's only Cork Oak tree which dominates a garden in Pine Grove which you get to from the Emsworth Road via Bellair and Oaklands Road (turn right off Oaklands Road and it is on your left). Now full grown the tree has a magnificent 'cork' bark and is well worth a look and if you enjoy unusual trees you can combine a visit to this one with a tour round Connaught and Montgomery Roads before rejoining Bellair Road, en route seeing a tall and healthy Ginkgo in Connaught Rd, an elderly Strawberry Tree (in Montgomery Rd) and a Locust Tree (Robinia pseudoacacia) as you turn back into Bellair Rd. In an Oaklands Rd garden my first Dotted Loosestrife was in flower

As I entered Bellair from Emsworth Road I had a look at the parking area next to the Bowls Club and found several plants of Sticky Groundsel (not yet in flower but still a first for the year)

From Montgomery Rd I clambered down onto the Billy Trail and turned right towards New Lane but just before emerging onto it I sniffed the crushed leaves of a new wild rose bush and the smell of apples confirmed this was my first flowering Sweet Briar of the year. Before reaching the New Lane cemetery I saw my first Spear thistle flower of the year but the recently mown cemetery had nothing new to offer so I continued up New Lane to the allotments where both Broad-leaved Everlasting Pea and Weasels Snout (Misopates orontium) aka Lesser Snapdragon were in flower.

On my way home I popped into the railway carpark by the disused singnal box and added Hawkweed Oxtongue to my new flowers for the year. While there I spotted another Cordyline palm flowering in an adjacent garden. My total of flowering species this morning was 63

Back at home I had an email from Martin Rand, the south Hants plant recorder, concerning the plant which I had found last Thursday and thought was Narrow-leaved Ragwort. From the photos I sent Martin thinks it may be the even more uncommon Senecio squalidus subsp. chrysanthemifolius - a relative of Oxford Ragwort which originates from the slopes of Moutn Etna and of which there is only one known example in Britain. I now have to collect a specimen for expert determination.

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The wind today precluded cycling so I walked to the Langstone South Moors to check on the Southern Marsh Orchids, going via Southmoor Lane to first check on the Knotted Hedge Parsley but not expecting anything else of much interest.

In fact I found nine newly flowering plants for the year, one of them being something I have not previously found in the Havant area - Narrow Leaved Ragwort (Senecio inaequidens) - and the Marsh Orchids were in excellent condition and high numbers.

Passing the northwest quadrant of the Langstone roundabout I looked for, but did not see, the plants of Narrow-leaved Pepperwort that have flowered in the roadside pavement in recent years but they are still present in a new location alongside the slip-road approaching the roundabout from the east bound A27 (where the soil has been disturbed this year in the course of installing extended crash barriers alongside the road - I found two flowering plants here)

Nothing more until I had walked under the A27 beside the Langbrook stream and then turned west along the cycleway running parallel to the A27 - somewhere here I spotted a small plant of a Bedstraw in flower and collected it to identify when I got home but foolishly I did not note where I found it as my tentative id is Wall Bedstraw which would be a good find (I have only seen this at Farlington Marshes where Geoff Farwell found it a few years back) - until I have re-found it and had another look I am not claiming this as any more than a possible id.

Emerging from the cycleway into Brookside Road I stopped to record my first Creeping Thistle flowers for the year after spotting it in the flowerbeds (planted with some low growing Cotoneaster) close to the entrance to one of the Langstone Technology Park carparks. Running my eye round the other weeds in this flowerbed I saw one was a Ragwort just starting to flower but this was clearly not the Common Ragwort that is the only species I have seen flowering so far - the leaves (see photo below) showed it to be Narrow Leaved Ragwort which I have only previously seen at Nutbourne Farm Lane in Sussex, making this find possibly a first for the Havant area (SU70 10km square)

Walking on south down Southmoor Lane I stopped around halfway down outside Lewmar Marine where a single wooden telegraph pole (nowadays unused - supporting no wires!) marks the end of a short section of narrow grass bank, backed by a wooden fence. At the foot of this fence Knotted Hedge Parsley has grown for many years and could be seen again today with the first flowers of the current year. A little further south, at the foot of the last of several sign boards marking entrances to Lewmar sites, I found more of these plants where I have not seen them before.

My next find came at the point where the Havant Borough offices give way to the Southen Electric carpark. Here several plants of what I assumed to be Common Figwort were in flower (and clearly had been for some time as many flowers had been replaced by fruit). The fact that I have not seen Figwort in flower elsewhere until now (while these plants have been out for some time) coupled with the 'speckled' look to the flowers, made me wonder if this was some uncommon Figwort species but it does not seem to fit the three candidates listed by Stace.

At Budds Farm the Swans still had their six cygnets and the only Shelduck to be seen were just two adults. Canada Geese had increased to five and the other usual suspects were present but the unusual feature today was the presence of many House Martins and a few Swifts trawling for insects over the water (the only Swallows were doing the same over the grass of the South Moors). The Swifts reminded me that yesterday, as the rain eased but the low cloud and strong wind made the presence of Swifts unlikely, two flew over my garden and another was seen over it first thing this morning - normally Swifts take advantage of their speed and understanding of aerial currents to leave a storm area and fly to somewhere with better weather even if it is several hundred miles from their nest area (the chicks are able to go into a sort of suspended animation and survive even if the parents do not come back with food for a couple of days).

On the South Moors there was a better than usual display of Southern Marsh orchids - I even found one near the field entrance gate outside the boundary marked by the drainage channel around the south-west quadrant of the 'orchid field'. In the central stream running down the east side of the orchid field my first Brooklime was in flower as was Tufted Forget-me-not further down that stream while in among the orchids I found Common Marsh Bedstraw and Self-Heal

That occupied the afternoon but in the morning I visited Langstone Pond to check on the Egret nests where the lack of action has been puzzling me. Reflecting on the story of this year's breeding attempt so far for yesterday's weekly summary I realised that there should be some positive sign of young in the nests by now yet I have not detected anything beyond two glimpses of adults standing in their nests and poking about in the bottom of their nests in a way which might indicate that they had heard noise coming from the eggs and were wondering what was going on.

For anyone unfamiliar with Langstone Pond the best place from which to see the nests is near the bridge over the Lymbourne stream - come past the Royal Oak pub and over this bridge, then stop by the wire-mesh covered window before you come to the wooden fence and door/gate leading into the Mill property. You should be able to see up to 20 nests from here though there are some three other nests only visible from near the Interpetation Board near the other duck feeding point on the seawall.

The afternoon outing started when John Norton picked me up from home and we drove towards Emsworth under the A27 junction but stopped in the access road to the first houses you come to on the north side of the A259 (where it straightens out after the enforced curve necessitated by the construction of the new road underpass and its links to the A27). Walking back along the old pre-A27 road which now leads only to a pedestrian/cycle underpass we followed the old road surface to where it end in a fence guarding the new A27 sliproad and close to this fence, in ground that seems to have turned from grass to baked desert in the hot period of this spring, John Norton found just one plant of the rare Clustered Clover (Trifolium glomeratum) which has been seen here each spring since 2007 (at least) when I found plants scattered over a patch measuring 5 x 1 metre. John may also have found a new plant for this site - several specimens growing at the foot of the fenceline but as yet showing no flowers or even buds to confirm that the leaves were those of Knotted Hedge Parsley.

We then drove on to meet Brian Fellows in the Emsworth Bridge Road carpark which has one of his more successful 'Emsworth Waysides' wildflower collections among which I added two personal 'firsts for the year' with flowering Sulphur Cinquefoil and Wall Lettuce. We then walked to Brook Meadow where I was reminded that correct identification of Fumitories requires close scrutiny of the flowers (what I at first thought was Common Ramping Fumitory because of its exuberant growth and tendency to climb other plant was just Common Fumitory!)

Following the path round the north of the Meadow, below the railway, Eric Clement issued dire warnings that the growth of Himalayan Giant bramble bushes should be severely controlled before they spread over the whole meadow! Walking south through the northern meadow Brian showed us the ten Southern Marsh orchids now in flower (the number of plants is increasing each year after a couple were introduced a few years ago) and before we reached the exit to Lumley Road John pleased Brian by adding a new species to the meadow list - the small and delicate Slender Spike Rush (Eleocharis uniglumis).

Walking back from Brook Meadow to Bridge Road John spotted two unexpected grasses in the pavement of Victoria Road - the Fern Grass (Catapodium rigidum) and Water Bent (a name which I could only find in my 1984 edition of C E Hubbard's Grasses and which he called Agrostis semiverticillata but which now appears in Stace's Flora as Polypogon semiverticillatus though still called Water Bent by him)

Next we went to Nore Barn and spent some time in the south-east meadow of Warblington Farm where we found a good showing of Sea Clover on the meadow facing bank of the seawall on either side of the point where the eastern stream of the farm runs out into the 'Nore Barn channel' of the harbour. While in the Nore Barn area I added White Bryony, Sea Plantain and Sea Arrowgrass to my personal 'first flowering' list

Mon 28 May

Having read that Grass Vetchling was out on Hayling last Saturday when the Havant Wildlife Group visited North Common I set course this morning for the Broadmarsh 'mountain' where the Grass Vetchling should be out with the possible bonus of Hairy Vetchling.

In my garden before setting out both Purple Toadflax and Broad-leaved Willowherb were newly flowering and before getting far I saw my first Magpie family out with their newly fledged young. Southmoor Lane brought the first new plant with Bugloss (Anchusa arvensis) flowering by the roadside (I usually only see this at the Hayling Island Black Point Sailing club) and before reaching the south end of the road I had added Horse Radish and Slender Thistle to my first flowers.

At Budds Farm Pools I found the Swans had six, not just five, cygnets but the Shelduck had no young on show though a fight between what I assumed to be the two males may have been provoked by a defensive feeling towards young about to emerge. The presence of a single Canada Goose suggested that we have not escaped without a nestful of goslings to add to their population. Both Cuckoo and Cetti's Warbler were singing and my first Weld flowers on the mound.

Heading along the shore from the Mound to the Hermitage Stream mouth I noticed a bush of Bittersweet Nightshade flourishing on a sole diet of shingle - presumably the 'var marinum'

Following the path up the Brockhampton Stream I found the flowers of Turkish Tutsan still flowering where a house boat had been moored many years ago (by the 'bridge to nowhere')

On the Broadmarsh 'mountain' I was greeted by a Small Copper butterfly but no Meadow Brown (last year the first were seen on May 19 and I had seen seven reports by this date). I soon found Grass Vetchling and also my first Smooth Tare (with its bigger, bluer flowers than the Hairy Tare which has been out for some time) but no sign of the Hairy Vetchling with its very distinctive leaves that I might well have spotted even if I was too early for the flowers - last year I did not see it until June 9 when masses were in flower (my earliest date is June 7 in 2008)

Coming down from the mound I soon found plenty of Hemlock in flower and at the west carpark there was a good show of Salsify as well as Rosy Garlic but the big surprise came when I reached the cycleway below the A27. Roughly opposite the point at which a stream flows under the cycleway into the harbour more than 20 Bee Orchids were coming into flower - several with their first flowers open. After photographing these I cycled on towards Farlington Marshes and found not only Brown Knapweed but also some six large clusters of Heath Speedwell in full flower - something I do not recall seeing here before (my main local site for it has always been the western path edges in the Hollybank Woods). Just one more personal new flower seen before I left this cycleway - Pale Flax.

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This morning I walked via Pook Lane and along the shore to Nore Barn and back through Warblington Farm passing both Square-stemmed and Broad-leaved Willowherb in flower for the first time and coming on clear proof that Rough Chervil is now taking over from Cow Parsley. With the latter I found my first Scented Mayweed with its smaller flowers than Scentless and with a hollow 'receptacle'. Coming back thorough Warblington Farm I heard a Cuckoo and then saw it flying east from the Watercress Beds where a Cetti's Warbler was singing. Beside the main road back into Havant Foxgloves were opening their first flowers and in Havant I saw the first flowers on Ground Elder as a group of House Martins could be heard passing over.

Although Common Mallow was flowering in January today seems to be the first on which it has resumed general flowering.

On the way out I diverted through the 'new' Langstone housing to find the Least Yellow Oxalis was at last in flower. I then continued on Southbrook Road to its junction with the main Hayling Road where wildflower seed has been sown to cover an area of road edge recently dug up - the resulting plants included several of the aromatic Corn Chamomile substitutes (Anthemis austriaca).

Following the old rail track on the far side of the main road to the point where the mouth of the Langbrook stream comes into sight I was pleased to see the local Swan pair with all six of their surviving cygnets but I was surprised to see them 'surrounded' by six hefty Great Blackback Gulls (I noticed that the male Swan kept between the gulls and his cygnets!).

Also seen on the old railbridge embankment were my first Bladder Campion flowers and Hemlock just coming into flower

At the Oysterbeds two Common Terns seemed to be on nests at the very southern end of the islands and Dog Roses were starting to appear around the area. Heading towards the carpark the maritime version of Bittersweet Nightshade was flowering in the shingle and a few Milk Thistle leaves could be seen at the southern end of the earth mound behind the lagoon.

Reaching North Common I found the hay field had been cut, attracting Swallows and Black-headed Gulls to the disturbed insects - more gulls were hawking for insects at several other places this morning. No new flowers at North Common but as I was cycling there I passed a very fresh looking plant of 'Cow Parsley' in a ditch and noticed that it had a wholly purple hiary stem making it a good candidate for the first Rough Chervil of the year.

I spent three hours on Portsdown Hill today in glorious hot sunshine seeing six species of butterfly, including my first Small and Comon Blues plus a resplendent Beautiful Demoiselle far from water, and four new flowering plants (Rockrose, Hairy Rockcress (Arabia hirsuta), Fairy Flax and Kidney Vetch plus an almost certain find of Horseshow Vetch - though I omitted to check the leaves and relied on the circular shape of the flower head). No hint of the Early Gentain that I had hoped for though I partly made up for that by having the only singing Yellowhammer of the day performing at the spot where the Gentian should have been.

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First of the new flowers was White Clover, found in Juniper Square where I also found the first Catsear. Not new for the year, but enjoying its first major outburst of flowers, was a mass of Yellow flowered Strawberry at the site by the Langbrook stream immediately south of the old IBM approach road and further down the stream I encountered Speckled Wood and Orange-tip butterflies. A little further down stream a bush of Japanese Rose (Rosa rugosa) was starting to flower and this had its status as newly flowering when I reached the South Moors seawall and found several bushes covered with flowers. Leaving the area alongside gardens and going through the first kissing gate I came on a huge plant of Hogweed in full flower - this had been found sporadically up to mid March but not since so deserves note as first of the season.

On the South Moors a flock of more than 50 young Starlings was noisily seeking food as I entered the 'orchid field' to look for leaves to mark the presence of orchid plants - I only saw less than a dozen plants but among them was one Southern Marsh orchid which had a fully expanded flower head though none of the flowers was yet open. Yellow Iris were flowering everywhere and there were still a few clumps of Marsh Marigold in flower while the black cones of Marsh Horsetail were to be seen in increasing numbers.

Reaching Southmoor Lane I heard a Cuckoo whose calls continued all the time I was within earshot and another noteworthy find here were the many plants (not yet flowering) of Slender Thistle. Turning up the slope towards the viewing point above the pools I found the first Dog Roses and took the poor photo below to confirm the find.

On the pools the Swans had five new cygnets on the water and I think two pairs of Shelduck are probably sitting on eggs - at the west end a single bird sitting patiently on the concrete wall suggested that he had a hidden mate and in the eastern pools a pair of birds were feeding and having a 'wash' suggesting that the female was having a brief time off nest duty. One species that pleased me by its absence was Canada Goose, and one that I heard but did not see was Cetti's Warbler.

Another pleasing sound was that of Meadow Pipit song as I reached the seawall - I think there were at least two pairs though I only saw one 'parachuting'. Also seen on the seawall was a single Small Heath butterfly and on the sea with the tide high were a pair of Swans with no cygnets making me wonder if I would see the Langstone Pond pair with their seven cygnets which hatched on May 2 and were seen leaving the pond for the safety of the harbour waters on May 5 (I assumed they were heading for the mouth of the Langbrook Stream as they have done in several recent years)

Walking up the Langbrook stream I saw many Swallows skimming its surface but no Swans and when I reached Langstone Pond (where the Egrets were still sitting with no sign of having hatched young) the only Swan that I saw was an agitated female on the harbour water - at first she was swimming fairly fast with wings half erect as if chasing off a rival but she then returned to a point near the pond sluice gate, stood up in shallow water, flapped her wings and was unexpectedly vocal (I read recently that a female at the Milton Lakes in Southsea used her voice to call back her young cygnets when they headed off following a non-breeding adult thought to be one of the breeding female's last year brood). I hope all this does not mean there has been a disaster to the Langstone family....

Just one more note on the way home - a single Red Admiral butterfly.

One observation from my garden yesterday was of 8 Swifts screaming overhead at twice roof-top height

A forecast of a sunny day tempted me to cycle to south Hayling and the section down the Billy Trail south of the Havant Bypass showed a major clearance of trackside bramble giving me a clear view of the Common Comfrey plants on the left just after emerging from the underpass and promising new plant discoveries in the large area now able to see the light of day.

Across the main road the 'Southmere' field was a delightful reminder of what hayfields should look like at this time of year - buttercups everywhere! Heading south I found the Greater Celandine plant still flowering on the left just before the harbour water came into view and when over the bridge I saw my first Common Tern over the northern most of the Oysterbed pools. At the nesting islands the Black-headed Gulls had no visible chicks but several of the adult birds made sure that a Kestrel which attempted to hover over the islands did not stay. While here I took a few photos of the Dames Violet plants which are now in flower but I don't seem to have an image of the single 'violet coloured' plant among the many white flowered.

South of the Oysterbeds a single Salsify plant was in flower as were several of the Sea Kale plants on the shingle. Further south, passing the Saltmarsh Lane marsh, I saw that the seawall was covered with a mass of yellow brassica flowers so I diverted there to check that the plants were the Bastard Cabbage that has been increasing its foothold there in recent years. My photos hopefully give an impression of the mass of yellow that caught my eye in the first place and also show the 'Chianti bottle' shaped seed pods that identify the plant. The seaward end of the track leading to the seawall also had a good show of Lesser Sea Spurrey and Subterranean Clover.

At the Kench I rode out to the Bladder Senna bush but found no hint of flowers though I did notice that two young bushes are growing at the foot of the very ancient looking stem of the original. While there I heard the 'tittering' of an unseen Whimbrel and noticed that Sea Radish is now in flower.

At the roundabout near the Ferry Inn several plants of Hares-tail Grass were new and a close look at the ground showed that as well as the remnants of the Early Forget-me-not there is now a mass of even tinier blue flowers on Wall Speedwell. Alongside the harbour entrance carpark Tree Lupin bushes had many flower buds but none yet open.

Leaving the carpark for the track leading to the sailing club I found Round-leaved Cranesbill in full flower and among the sand dunes (and everywhere in the orchid area) the minute flowers of Spring Vetch caught my eye - you have to look closely to see them! Easier to spot was the Yellow Rattle that is now in flower.

A couple of Skylarks sang briefly over the area south of the golf course and from further out on the bare shingle I twice heard the call of a Ringed Plover which will have a nest somewhere there.

In the area south of Staunton Avenue I noticed Common Ramping Fumitory clambering up and flowering among the gorse and saw one open flower on Sea Sandwort before setting off for home - the only notes from this homeward journey were, first, while passing the Oysterbeds I heard two Med Gulls calling overhead (maybe they haven't abandoned the area!) and , second, back in Wade Court Road I heard a Nuthatch in the same trees where I had heard and seen one on Mar 21 but not since!

The only new spring flower seen in a walk around Havant this morning was Creeping Cinquefoil found in the Havant Eastern Road cemetery where I also found what seemed to be aberrant Cuckooflower - a cluster of plants looking like Cuckooflower and in typical habitat but having 'double petalled' flowers. Another find here was a Cockspur Thorn tree in flower and retaining some of its large fruits from last year. Very nearly in flower was Bittersweet Nightshade and looking over the wall to the spoil heap of the adjacent allotment I saw a plant of Russian Comfrey in flower.

Wandering on via Crossways I passed garden escape Pot Marigolds in flower and heard a lot of excited chatter from Starlings over the nearby houses causing me to look up and see a Sparrowhawk battling with the fairly strong wind.

Turning south down the Petersfield Road I noted a clump of Small Flowered Cranesbill in the roadside grass where Danish Scurvygrass was still in flower

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From the main east-west track I turned south onto the track which comes out near the entrance to Hammonds Land Coppice and runs alongside what I still call the 'orchid ditch' in memory of past years when around 200 Common Spotted Orchids would flower here in late May and June but today there were no leaves to be seen though the first Lesser Spearwort flowers were out and there was a great show of Bugle and a big cluster of St George's Mushrooms.

Before getting here I had passed my first Rhododendron and Silverweed flowers and back on the main track I watched Large White and Orange Tip butterflies (later adding Speckled Wood) and had close views of several Linnets.

On the north east side of this track junction I was delighted to find two examples of a plant which I have in the past seen on the south side of the junction and found a mass of on Blendworth Common to the west of the Thicket but which I was not expecting to see today. I took two photos which appear below of these specimens of Bitter Vetchling (Lathyrus linifolius)

Nothing more of special interest until I reached the site of the plants which were my main reason for coming here today and which rewarded me with the best show I can recall. These are the wild version of Lily of the Valley and the photos below show they are thriving and flowering well (the cluster photographed is only one of several here). To find them follow the eastern peripheral track north from the vehicle entrance almost opposite Castle Road until you come to the first main track branching off to the left. Do not follow that but continue north for what I measured today as 140 of my paces until you are under the only Beech Tree branch to reach out over the track from a tree on the right and here you will find the first cluster of plants on your left. (Map ref SU 718108). Further clusters of the plants can be found further north on the left (west) side of the track

The tide was at its highest and the wind was strong, making substantial waves and bringing renewed rain - by the time I got home my trousers were soaked through! My first reward for this soaking came at the shore carpark where Rosy Garlic was starting to flower and near it was a cluster of hybrid Campion flowers - some pale pink among a majority of whitish.

Walking back along the northern edge of the grassland I remembered that, as I drove in, I had noticed some large mushrooms on the west bank of the slipway approach road and I now headed for where I had seen them. What I found were my first Parasol mushrooms of the season and near them were the remains of Shaggy Ink Caps, a troop of Marasmius oreades (Fairy Ring Mushrooms), and a couple of unidentified species to add to two which I had found growing on my lawn on Monday - the rain has at last brought the expected fungal outburst!

Up on the 'mountain' east of the slipway approach road I was expecting to see a crop of Salsify (last year I found an estimated 300 plants flowering here on May 12 and I had seen some flowering in Havant on Monday) but there was no sign of them nor of the Hairy Vetchling (though I was not expecting that - first flowers last year were seen on June 9). I hope that the grazing ponies chained out here this year will not eliminate the floral diversity...

Coming down the east side of the mountain to the path beside the Hermitage Stream I found a good show of Early Wintercress (Barbarea intermedia) with its pinnate leaves. Normally this is the first species I come across but this year I found the common Winter Cress (B. vulgaris) flowering on Apr 30 and the first of the Early species was not seen until May 6 when Brian Fellows found it in Emsworth.

The late afternoon weather suggested a local walk without rain and I decided to have a look at the wet SSSI field of Warblington Farm where I found a lot of Subterranean Clover in flower along with the first Sea Milkwort and Celery leaved Buttercup. At least one Reed Warbler was singing in the Reed Bed and two male Reed Buntings were singing at each other across the marsh.

By the footpath around the south of the church, near the entrance to the cemetery extension, were several Chamomile like plants with buds but no open flowers and I have been unable to decide what they are - when I collected a small sample I found they were pleasantly aromatic and I wonder if they might be Sicilian Chamomile from seed introduced into the 'natural burial' area of the cemetery but I will need a second visit when they are in flower.

At the east end of the farm, in the stream running along the edge of Nore Barn woodland, Yellow Iris was beginning to flower and after walking north up what I call the 'Selangor Avenue footpath' I crossed the A259 to find a new garden escape flowering at the foot of the wooden fence which confronts you after using the road crossing point - this was a plant I know well from the Sinah Common area of South Hayling and is called 'Snow in Summer' (Cerastium tomentosum).

Walking back into Havant I came on another first for the year flower near Meadowland road - Salsify (the purple flowered relative of Goatsbeard which I have not come across yet this year). A little further on, passing the entrance to the Conservative Club, I heard Goldcrest song to make up for missing the Cuckoo at Langstone Pond (as I passed the pond at the start of my walk I was asked if Cuckoos would lay eggs in the Egret nests as the Cuckoo had been heard at the pond just before I arrived - my answer was no, the Cuckoo would be more interested in Reed Warblers)

Delays in getting round to writing this entry means that I have news to add from Tuesday when I saw my first Holly Blue in the garden and found my first St George's Mushroom in Havant roadside grass

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I set off via Brook Meadow at Emsworth where, close to the southern entrance, I found the purple flowers of Common Comfrey which Brian Fellows had seen on May 2. Crossing the main road I then found my first Tree Mallow flower outside one of the houses in Slipper Mill Road (the plants which used to grow on the edge of the pond seem to have been eliminated in the cause of 'gardening' that side of the road though the plants near the entrance to the marina survive). While here I watched one of the nesting Great Blackbacks having a wash while its mate sat on the nest.

Before leaving the marina for the Thorney Deeps I rode north up the marina seawall, finding my first Hedgerow Cranesbill flowers among the great mass of what I assumed to be the Black Mustard which I have found growing here in past years though I did not check its features as I should have done as this is my first for the year. Also seen here (but not counted) are the pretty pink cultivars of Tamarisk which are widely planted by roadsides, etc, but which I have never been able to name. From the northern end of this seawall I had a good view of a Swan sitting tightly on the island between the two boat entrances to the marina.

Reaching the immense reed beds north of the Little Deeps I was stopped in my tracks by a calling Cuckoo which has been heard here by others since Apr 17 though it was my first. It was some time before I got going again as the air and the reeds/scrub were full of birds. Swallows predominated and it was not long before I noticed a Swift and then added my first Sand and House Martins. In the hedge a Whitethoat was singing and from a small tree not far into the reeds came the monotous song of a Reed Bunting with several much more interesting Sedge Warblers in song plus a couple of Cetti's (no Reed Warblers here but there was a Lesser Whitethroat near the NRA track)

Moving down to the end of the Little Deeps I found the Swan sitting tight on her very little island (no Canada Geese here). Over the fields to the south Skylarks were singing but I did not go on down the track to the Great Deeps but instead retraced my path back to the NRA track where I turned east.

Nothing more of significance until the seawall from Prinsted to Nutbourne where 8 Wheatears (my first!) hopped from rock to rock along the sea defences. Turning north to Farm Lane I added another flower in the hedgerow - a cluster of Cleavers/Goosegrass was covered with tiny white flowers.

From the A259 I turned north along Priors Leaze Lane to Hambrook where I passed my first flowering Solomons Seal in a garden and a patch of garden escape Creeping Comfrey elsewhere in the village. After the Hairspring Watercress Beds (nothing more interesting than one Moorhen and one Mallard) I joined the main road going north over the busy A27 and on the north side of the bridge over the A27 I was surprised to see both Solomons Seal and Lungwort at the roadside - both had been planted in the soil disturbed by the installation of new crash barriers. Still on the hill I began to find my first genuinely wild Ramsons (Wild Garlic) and at the top of the hill, where I turned west into the road leading to Woodmancote, I found what seemed to be genuine self sown Lungwort.

Next place of interest was Marlpit Lane where I dutifully added Nightingale song (only one) to my list before joing the busy Funtington road back towards Aldsworth where wild Yellow Archangel was flowering in the roadside.

At Aldsworth Pond I had the pleasure of adding Canada Goose to my daylist and was then surprised to hear Reed Warbler.

Heading for home via Westbourne, Long Copse Lane and Southleigh Road I passed my first Bird Cherry tree in flower and after crossing the Horndean Road I found a cluster of large Horse Mushrooms in the roadside grass of Southleigh Road immediately west of Horndean Road.

Back in Denvilles I remembered that last time I rode along Fourth Avenue I had seen something of interest in a small garden at the bend in the road close to the house numbered 31 - I spotted the garden and saw a rather uninteresting small tree in it but it was not until sometime later that I rembered what was of interest - on the last occasion I saw it there were no leaves on the tree but it did have the strange white flowers looking like handkerchiefs which picked it out as a Dove Tree (Davidia involucrata) and gives it status as the only specimen of the species that I know of in Havant now that the old tree at Shawford House (off Wade Court Road) has been chopped down.

I did not venture far in yesterday's chill and damp but on my way home from voting I checked the 'Greater Herb Robert' (possibly Geranium reuteri) on the wall of an alley south of East Street and was delighted to find it had several large and colourful flowers now open.

This morning I had a rewarding cycle ride to south Hayling and back, seeing my first Little Tern, a Swift, seven tiny cygnets on Langstone Pond, and eleven newly flowering plants.

Before reaching Langstone Bridge on the way south I had found an unexpected plant of Greater Celandine in flower plus my first Pendulous Sedge, and as soon as I reached the Hayling part of the old Billy Track proper I found I was looking at my first Little Tern fishing close to me in the north-east pool of the Oysterbeds area - this was the only one I saw as there were none near the nesting islands in the lagoon (nor were there any Med Gulls, just lots of Black-headed, several carrying lumps of seaweed to their nests)

Reaching the south Hayling Ferry Road I found another botanic first in the roadside grass when I stopped at the road junction - a mass of tiny flowered Wall Speedwell, and (after watching a small party of Whimbrel in the Kench) as I turned into the Ferry carpark I found Snow-in-summer (Cerastium tomentosum) had started to flower. The stretch alongside the harbour entrance gave me my first Sea Radish, Bur Chervil and Spring beauty with the tiny Spring Vetch flowering on the remains of a sand dune among the Tamarisks. On the shingle there is now a mass of Sea Kale plants but none were in flower (some had tightly closed flowerheads).

Along the south of the Golf Course there were hundreds of the Green Winged Orchids now flowering but no sign of flowers on the Lupins. Yellow Rattle was not yet in flower but one plant of Bird's Foot Trefoil was out and over the Golf Course a Meadow Pipit was making parachute song flights.

Coming out into the area east of the Golf Course Thrift was widespread and nearing the public toilets I found three more 'first flowers'. One was the Shepherd's Cress I had expected on my last visit, another was the Smith's Pepperwort which is widespread here and the third was Buckshorn Plantain that we will soon see in many places. Linnets were as expected singing from the Gorse here but no sign of a Dartford Warbler - to make up for that a single Swift shot overhead.

At Langstone Pond I had three surprises - the Swan pair had seven healthy looking cygnets out of the nest, the first Reed Warblers were back and singing, and four pairs of Tufted Duck were on the water

This morning I drove to the hilltop carpark just east of the London Road and the George Pub and walked west to the far end of the Paulsgrove Chalk Pit and back. Birds, butterflies, wild flowers and various small creatures all got on my list with the highlights being lots of Whitethroats and several Lesser Whitethroats, eight butterfly species and several newly flowering plants (Wintercress, Annual Wall-rocket, Rough Hawkbit, Sanicle, Wild Mignonette, and Common Poppy) plus a mass of St Marks Flies.

Near the car park Sainfoin had flower buds as did Salad Burnet and I soon heard the first of many Whitethroats in song. After crossing the London Road I came on the first of several colonies of Slender Speedwell and crossing to the north side of Portsdown Hill Road before getting to the main Viewpoint Carpark I took the path on the north side of the road which I have not used before and where this passes under trees I was surprised to find a small cluster of Moschatel leaves (no flowers) and around these trees were a mass of St Marks Flies.

Nearing the north side of Fort Widley I had unexpected Willow Warbler song to add to that of Chiffchaffs and Blackcaps. On the path behind the Fort I had to avoid treading on a Fox Moth caterpillar urgently seeking somewhere to pupate - these overwinter as caterpillars and do more feeding in the spring but they are supposed to pupate in March or April and to emerge as moths in May so this one is leaving it late. Emerging from the path round the Fort I found that cattle were in the field behind the carpark on the far side of Mill Lane but they had left my first Common Poppy among the stems of the Rape whose leaves they had been enjoying.

Continuing west to the hilltop roundabout I went through the small carpark there to enter the field between it and the Quinetic research establishment and in this field I not only had my first Field Pansies (which have been out for a good three weeks) but also found the first Wintercress (Barbarea vulgaris) in flower plus some Field Forget-me-not.

In the area above the Paulsgrove Chalk Pit I saw my first Birds-foot Trefoil and Annual Wall Rocket plus Sanicle with Black Bryony already showing flower buds. Here I also heard the first of at least three Lessser Whitethroats in song

In the bottom of the chalkpit the midday sun had brought out many butterflies and I listed Orange Tip, Large and Small White, Brimstone, Comma, Peacock, Red Admiral and Speckled Wood. While in the bottom of the pit I scanned the cliffs above me to see if I could spot Wild Cabbage growing on the chalk - the Durlston website had reported this in flower a few days ago and when writing my weekly summary yesterday I checked the Hants Flora to see if this plant of sea cliffs grows in mainland Hampshire as well as the Isle of Wight. The Flora entry said that Francis Rose had found it on the chalk of the Paulsgrove Pit in 1978 and I have no idea if it has been seen since but I saw a dozen large Brassica plants high on the bare chalk only 110 metres from the east end of the pit and I have sent a note of this to Martin Rand and Richard Jones (as warden of Portsdown Hill) so I may hear more (though I have no certainty that the plants I saw were Wild Cabbage though their broad leaves and yellow flowers made them a possible candidate)

After leaving the pit the strong south east wind deterred me from climbing the hill face so I kept to the lowest path (along the back of the housing) for a long as possible and in so doing came across my first White Campion in flower. When very nearly back to the car I saw my first Laburnum tree in flower

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