A Questionable Beginning

A questionable beginning? I hear you ask. Well, questionable by some I'm sure (you know who you are) but as far as I'm concerned I'm satisfied that today's lifers were all perfectly legitimate and fine to count. Ok, so a couple may have been somewhat borderline, but all's fair in love and war and I do have a target to achieve...

On the 8th October I finished work a little after 10pm, took a quick shower, grabbed an overnight bag and promptly hit the road. I had the following two days off work and a bit of mainland botany seemed like a good way to spend the time. I arrived at Kingsteps near Nairn sometime after midnight, parked the car in a quiet corner of the car park (opposite the 'No Overnight Parking' sign as it happens) and managed a few hours kip before the noise of about a million Pink-footed Geese leaving their roost woke me up sometime around dawn. 

A quick shomble out of the car park soon had me eye-balling California Brome Ceratochloa carinata on my way to the spot where Salt-marsh Goldenrod Solidago sempervirens grows at its sole British outpost. I have absolutely no idea how the goldenrod arrived here, I'm not sure anybody knows, but it's certainly very well established along the ditches. If you want to go see it for yourself the grid ref is NH902576. I don't believe in witholding site gen for most stuff, not without a good reason. So yeah welcome to my blog, the place to glean gen! 

Kingsteps at Nairn 

Point A is Kingsteps car park, grid ref NH90165745. Point B is the track that leads out of the car park and has Californian Brome growing in the verges. Point C is approximately NH90195766 and that's where the Salt-marsh Goldenrod grows, alongside acres of Baltic Rush Juncus balticus and a few clumps of Distant Sedge Carex distans. I had gen that told me Flixweed grows nearby, but the spot is now massively overgrown and entirely unsuitable, so no joy as far as that goes. Pity, Flixweed would have been a lifer. 

 

My next site was a garden centre. Ordinarily I only visit garden centres to look for the appropriately named Garden Centre Spider Uloborus plumipes, but on this occasion I was in search of a plant. Decora Garden Centre (IV30 4DE on the SatNav) was visited where I surreptitiously lifted a few plant pots in an unsuccessful search for exotic woodlice and centipedes. Then I turned my attention to cracks in the paving slabs and various untidy corners where 'troublesome weeds' were allowed to grow unmolested. No sign of my target plant, so I did a second sweep of the site, this time incorporating the soil of potted trees. Before long I had found the first of several 'questionable' lifers of the day

New Zealand Bittercress Cardamine corymbosa in a plant pot

Ian Green, BSBI Vice County recorder for Moray, had previously found New Zealand Bittercress in this very garden centre, in fact it was his gen I was chasing. Ian frst recorded it here way back in August 2003 and his most recent record dates from November 2020. Happily it was still here today, if you want to check it out for yourself you need to look in the giant plant pots that the Olive trees are sitting in. I don't think they'll be going anywhere soon, not at the price they're currently selling for. But hey, that's Number 6826 sorted. You can have a quick read about the occurence of New Zealand Bittercress in Scotland by clicking here.

I headed off to a nearby beach/golf course and bumped into some plants I've only infrequently met before

Meadow Saffron (like a crocus but with 6 stamens) and Common Bistort

I found good numbers of Meadow Saffron Colchicum autumnale, a plant which I've only seen once before, and Common Bistort Bistorta officinalis is always a lovely thing to see in flower. It turns out that there's no need to walk across the entire flippin' golf course like I did because, as I eventually discovered, these are growing right next to the car park at NJ22617088. Hare's-foot Clover was commonplace all around the car park, not a plant I'm used to seeing this far north so that was a pleasant surprise. Loads of Sea Buckthorn all around the car park too, but if the associated bracket fungus was present I managed to miss finding it. 

I had gen for Phacelia tanacetifolia growing along a recently disturbed roadside verge in America. Yep, America. I checked the grid ref and it came up as a roadside spot near Briach Farm, Dallas. Rather bizarrely I have a vague recollection of diverting to Dallas once before. Probably for much the same reason I diverted to Moscow in Ayrshire at the start of this year - purely to say I've been there! But this time I was on the trail of a plant. Unfortunately for me I didn't have an OS map that covered the area in question and my phone suddenly lost all signal. I ended up driving down random roads, following my handheld GPS and somehow arrived at the appointed roadside verge without mishap. Next time I'll take a screenshot before my phone signal drops out.

I didn't think to take a pic, so here's the spot on Google Maps (June 2023)

It was immediately apparent that the steep roadside verge had been fairly recently machined into place, presumably by a bulldozer or somesuch, and had yet to become vegetated. The kerbside area, however, was a profusion of flowering plants. Clearly the whole strip had been sown with one of those godawful wildflower mixes full of exotic plants that have no place in this part of the world. In a bit of a huff, I threw the car into a gateway and stalked down the verge in search of the presumably sown, and hence entirely untickable, Phacelia. 

This is not Phacelia. This is Garden Radish Raphanus sativus

Garden Radish Raphanus sativus dominated the verge, probably 200 metres of the stuff in a swathe maybe 4 or 5 metres wide. Clearly sown and entirely untickable. But... but there, just across the road, I found more Garden Radish scattered randomly across quite a large area of disturbed ground. Looking distinctly unsown, in fact. I looked at the multitude of seed pods in the sown area. I noted the gusting wind. I put two and two together and came to Number 6827. Sweet, I'm definitely having that! 

I continued my search for Phacelia, instead finding several Bread Wheat Triticum aestivum halfway up the earthen embankment
 

Bread Wheat Triticum aestivum

Amongst the masses of Garden Radish were numerous flowering spikes of Crimson Clover Trifolium incarnatum subsp. incarnatum, a very striking plant and again one I'd not seen before but very clearly part of the wildflower mix and hence untickable. Until I crossed the road, that is...

Crimson Clover Trifolium incarnatum subsp. incarnatum

Well, I do believe that must be number 6828, my third new plant of the day. What I'm really kicking myself about is the "large White Clover" with leaflets that somehow put me in mind of Tree Lupin leaves that was scattered around a field entrance on the opposite side of the road from the planted stuff. I looked at it but, for some inexplicable reason, I didn't take a photo or collect a sample. I guess I figured it was just a giant cultivated variety of White Clover... Back on Skye a couple of evenings later, I discovered that Ian Green had recorded Egyptian Clover at that precise spot. Feck. So I have now retrospectively added Egyptian Clover Trifolium alexandrinum to my PSL as number 6829. Obviously I'll still need to go back to key a sample and take lots of pics too. 

Scattered amongst the sown wildflower mix were a couple of smaller flowers that I didn't recognise. Happily I did take some pics this time.

French Marigolds and Treacle Mustard

I couldn't ID the French Marigold Tagetes patula in the field, I had to wait until I was back on Skye before sussing it. Presumably initially sown in the wildflower mix, it has now started to pop up in barish patches across the road and quite a way into an adjacent field too. Oddly, there are quite a few records for French Marigold both to the east and to the north of Inverness on the BSBI database. I only found the one plant of Treacle-mustard Erysimum cheiranthoides, standing all of about 12cm high. It may have been a poor specimen, but it remains the only one I've ever seen. Treacle-mustard is well known from the sandy soils around Speyside and up to the coast at Elgin, I really must visit this region more often. So that was Numbers 6830 and 6831 safely in the bag, what an incredible site this was. Then I spotted what looked like dozens of miniaturised Japanese Knotweeds sprouting out of an area of bare dirt in the entrance to a field. What the heck..?

This 'miniaturised Japanese Knotweed' is actually Buckwheat!

A closer look at the plant quickly revealed it to be nearer a knotgrass than a knotweed and within a short while I'd worked out that I was looking at Buckwheat Fagopyrum esculentum, Number 6832 and yet another new plant for me from this incredible spot! 

Proof

Just out of sheer stubborness, I walked the entire length of the freshly vegetated verge and then crossed the road and returned to where I'd started. I did a lot of checking but there was not a sniff of Phacelia. Still, adding Garden Radish, Crimson and Egyptian Clovers, French Marigold, Treacle-mustard and Buckwheat to my PSL whilst travelling no more than a few hundred metres more than compensated for the missing target plant! 

I generally meandered around the Elgin/Lossiemouth/Forres area for much of the day, but I think this post is already lengthy enough so I shall refrain from any more waffle. 

I headed down to Grantown-on-Spey and spent the night in a cheap but perfectly acceptable hotel on the main drag through town. From here I hatched yet more botanical plans for the following day...