Early April 2022
Fairly early on when learning about wildflowers you find out that the ubiquitous Dandelion is not one species, and that it is in fact 230+ (micro) species. Many botanists shy away from identifying microspecies due to the difficulties associated with identifying and confirming them, but with a new BSBI handbook out recently I thought I would give it a go. The book is very nice, but to be honest it went pretty much how I expected. Despite it being easy to notice differences particularly in leaf shape, stature etc, the issues arise with plasticity, whereby a species can look dramatically different if it has been mown, is competing against high vegetation, is growing in the shade, if the day you see it ends in a y etc etc. Some species produce different shaped leaves early on to those produced later, and that is before you even get started on understanding all of the different terms associated with ID and assessing colour, hairiness etc.
I had hoped to make inroads at least into identifying some of the species present at Whitlingham, but have so far got no further than a few to sub-group. Alex Prendergast ran several identification workshops but I was unable to attend any of them unfortunately. Nonetheless I do have names for two of the Dandelions seen during the month. Firstly Taraxacum lacistophyllum, a low growing plant with finely divided leaves seen on a dry grassy area at the Norfolk & Norwich hospital and identified by Alex. Secondly, and so far the only species I've identified correctly myself and had confirmed, Taraxacum leucopodon. This is a robust species with rather crinkly leaves and the terminal leaf lobe is described as looking like an old German helmet. I found it growing at Earlham Millenium Green.
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