NORWICH: Dalliances with dandelions

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.

WHITLINGHAM: January WeBS count (with bonus Goosander)

12th January 2020

The first WeBS count of the year at Whitlingham turned from a rather standard affair to an interesting one with the find of a drake Goosander in the conservation area bay. These sawbills have become a bit less regular in the Norwich area of late, althought there were quite a few sightings in 2019. In fact my last Whitlingham one was back in 2015, albeit I've not visited as much in the past couple of years. This bird appeared whilst I was scanning the bay from the path, giving the peachy glow that marks out the males, but then vanished by the time I tried to scan again from a different angle.

Other than the Goosander, selected species counts below (combined Great Broad/Little Broad):

Gadwall: 185 (2019: 430, 2018: 262)

Shoveler: 0 (2019: 7, 2018: 39)

Tufted Duck: 289 (2019: 307, 2018: 327)

Pochard: 14 (2019: 30, 2018: 59)

Coot: 87 (2019: 227, 2018: 192)

Little Egret: 5 (2019: 3, 2018: 0)

As you can see, the overwhelming trend is one of much lower numbers than the past few years. The mild weather this winter will undoubtedly be part of that - whilst I make cursory weather notes (windy, sunny etc) and record any ice cover, I wonder if I should be making a record of the temperature and weather pattern for each count to provide a bit more analysis of why numbers might be different. Tufted Duck numbers were only slightly down, but Coot numbers were only half the equivalent counts of late. The 2019 Gadwall count had been exceptional, but 185 is still well below the 2018 count, and the few Shoveler present on 1st Jan had departed.

A few other bits and bobs were noted on the walk. The common Agromyzid miner Phytomyza chaerophylli was evident in Cow Parsley, and there was a nice group of Common Inkcaps too. Alex Prendergast had asked naturalists to send him photos of winter-flowering Dandelions (most flower in April) because there are some rare/under-recorded species, and he initially wondered if I had found one of them called Taraxacum subericinum, but having consulted an expert it was decided that it wasn't. Dandelions, like Brambles, are actually an aggregate of many apomictic species (sometimes described as microspecies, although the term is frowned upon by those that study them).