Sweet Alison

Flower: White, occasionally pale purple, 5-6mm, 4 petals. Fruit: Flattened, oval seed pods bearing two seeds each. Leaves: Narrow, greyish-green, untoothed and lanceolate, usually having many whitish-silvery hairs.

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Sea Beet

Flower: Slender green spike of tiny petalless flowers, sometimes turning red. Fruit: The flowers form hard clusters at their bases which then turn into the multi-seeded fruit. Leaves: Dark green, wavy, leathery and shiny. The lower leaves are larger, have very curly edges and are triangular in shape. The upper leaves are narrower than the lower.

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Seaside Daisy

Flower: Pale purple solitary flowers with yellow centres growing up to 4cm wide. Fruit: Insignificant. Leaves: Fleshy, evergreen, spoon-shaped leaves, narrowing towards the top of the plant. Occasionally toothed.

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Common Glasswort

Flower: Tiny, green, yellow anthers, usually in groups of 3 up the stem, the central one being the largest. Fruit: Succulent, fleshy one-seeded fruit. Leaves: This plant looks a lot like asparagus in my personal opinion. The translucent leaves consist of many succulent, scale-like segments. They are arranged in opposite pairs, fused to envelop the stems. Th...

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Marram Grass

Flower: Long one-flowered dense flower spikes, straw-coloured. Fruit: A single-seeded dry fruit (caryopsis). Leaves: Sharp-pointed leaf blades at their tips. The leaves are also tightly rolled inwards and bluish green in colour. The upper surfaces are hairy but lower surfaces are glabrous.

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Common Orache

Flower: Slender, open, leafy, greenish, spike-like panicles. Fruit: A seed fused inside two diamond-shaped to triangular bracteoles. Leaves: Opposite, alternate leaves. Narrow, untoothed or almost toothless. Not hairy.

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Wild Pansy

Flower: Either violet-coloured or violet and yellow, rarely entirely yellow, up to 2.5cm. Spur is longer than sepals. Fruit: A 3-valved capsule, splitting open when ripe to release the seeds. Leaves: Alternate, short stalks, stipules present. The leaves are broadly lanceolate in shape and have round-toothed margins. The stipules are pinnate and leafy and the lobes are lanceolate with toothed margi...

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Knotted Pearlwort

Flower: 5 unnotched white petals reaching up to 1cm across. Our largest flowered Pearlwort in the UK. Fruit: Dull yellow, egg-shaped capsule. 4 or 5 valves, usually 5. Leaves: Basal rosette and stem leaves are both present. The stalkless stem leaves are positioned in opposite pairs and get smaller towards the top. The linear leaves are untoothed and thread-like, smooth and ...

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Scarlet Pimpernel

Flower: 5 petals fringed with hairs. Despite the name, the flowers are orange and not scarlet red. Fruit: A brown, round fruit capsule which contains many seeds. Ripens from August to October. Up to 6mm across. Leaves: The leaves are stalkless and grow in opposite pairs along the stems. They are oval-elliptical with pointed tips. The leaf margins are not toothed. The undersides of the leaves are black-dotted and hav...

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Buck's-horn Plantain

Flower: 2-4cm dense unbranched greenish-brown spikes. Yellow anthers. Fruit: A membranous fruit capsule, containing anything up to 5 seeds. Leaves: The name of this plant is derived from the shape of its leaves. They are said to resemble deer's antlers. The leaves are pale green, lance-shaped, up to 25cm long and 2.5cm wide. The leaf veins (3 to ...

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Yellow-horned Poppy

Flower: Yellow flower, up to 9cm. Fruit: A distinctive narrow, curving, horn-shaped seed capsule, up to 3cm long. The surfaces of the capsules are warty in appearance and each capsule contains hundreds of seeds. The Yellow-horned Poppy is sa... Leaves: Thick and leathery, silvery or bluish-grey leaves. Covered in many fine, short hairs. Deeply divided with wavy margins.

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Sea Rocket

Flower: Mauve or pale to dark lilac flowers borne in clusters, having 4 petals each. Fruit: Flattish, fleshy seed pods, containing 2 seeds each. Leaves: The leaves are alternately arranged along the stems. The succulent leaves are pinnately lobed with sparsely toothed edges. The lobes are linear in shape. Leaf surfaces are smooth and not hairy.

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Rock Samphire

Flower: Yellowish-green umbels with lobed lower bracts, up to 5cm wide. Fruit: A cylindrical capsule. Leaves: The succulent, fleshy leaves are pinnately divided into 2 or 3 linear lobes. The leaves are arranged alternately along the stems.

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Sea Sandwort

Flower: 5 small white unnotched petals and pale green narrow sepals which are shorter on the female flowers. Fruit: A green, 3-valved, globular capsule, up to 1cm long. Leaves: The opposite and stalkless, smooth and glossy leaves are untoothed, oval and pointed. Not hairy.

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Danish Scurvygrass

Flower: Clustered. White with 4 petals and 6 yellow stamens. Fruit: A broad, ovoid seed pod. Leaves: Simple, stalked leaves which alternate along the stem. The leaves are ivy-like but with heart-shaped bases.

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Lesser Sea-spurrey

Flower: 5 pink petals whitening towards the centre. Distinguishable from Greater Sea-spurrey in that it has longer sepals than petals, and that it bears smaller, pinker flowers. Fruit: A brown oval pod, up to 6mm long. Many-seeded. Leaves: Linear, fleshy leaves, in opposite pairs, up to 4cm long.

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Silverweed

Flower: Solitary, stalked bright yellow flowers with 5 petals, 2cm across. Fruit: Clusters of dry nutlets (achenes). Leaves: All of the leaves are basal leaves. They are divided into 5 to 17 sharply-toothed, oval leaflets. The leaves have a silvery sheen on their undersides. The leaves are up to 20cm long.

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Sheep Sorrel

Flower: Small and red, in compact leafless spikes, almost always unbranched. Fruit: A round, brown, 3-edged seed (achene). Leaves: Linear, untoothed, arrow-shaped leaves. The two linear basal lobes are pointed and distinctive in shape. Stem leaves are alternately arranged. Not hairy.

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Sea Spurge

Flower: Cup-shaped, yellowish-green flowers with leafy bracts. Fruit: A wrinkly capsule, containing 3 large seeds. The seeds are capable of floating in water. Leaves: Bluish-green, stalkless, succulent, oval leaves. The midrib is hidden on the underside of the leaf. The leaves are compactly crowded together close to the stem.

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Biting Stonecrop

Flower: 5 bright yellow untoothed, star-shaped petals. Fruit: Many-seeded. Leaves: The leaves alternate along the stems. They are small, ovoid, pale green, succulent, evergreen, blunt-tipped leaves.

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Common Storksbill

Flower: Small clusters of pinkish-purple flowers, sometimes white. 5 petals, the upper two each often having a black spot at their bases. Fruit: Beak-shaped fruit, up to 4cm long. This plant is named after the shape of its fruit. Leaves: 2-pinnate leaves with linear stipules at the leaf bases. The leaves are arranged in opposite pairs along the stems. The leaflets are finely lobed and toothed.

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Hairy Tare

Flower: Small pea-like, pale lilac and forming spikes on long stalks. Fruit: A flat, pea-like pod, up to 1cm long. Hairy and often densely hairy, hence the name of this plant. Leaves: Compound leaves with 12 to 16 linear leaflets and a forked tendril. Similar to Smooth Tare but Hairy Tare has a greater number of paired leaflets.

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Thrift

Flower: Clusters of tight globular pink flowerheads. Individual flowers are tiny and have 5 petals. At the top of each unbranched flowerstalk there exists a papery brown bract. Fruit: A one-seeded, brown fruit capsule. Leaves: Mat-forming. Grass-like, stiff, compact, fleshy, upright, linear leaves.

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