Two-spined Acaena

Flower: Globular flowerheads. Flowers are without petals. Each flower has 2 spines. White stamens. Fruit: The fruit is globular and spiny. The spines are purplish-red. Fruits measure up to 3cm in diameter. Leaves: A mat-forming perennial with bright green, pinnate leaves, up to 12cm long. The toothed leaflets are in 6 to 8 opposite pairs, plus a terminal leaflet. The young stems are hairy and often tinged red. ...

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Fragrant Agrimony

Flower: The inflorescence is a long flower spike. The flowers are about 1cm across with notched tips. 12 stamens. 2 pistils. Fruit: Bell-shaped, burred fruit with hooks that are down-turned. The fruit is about 1cm long. Leaves: No basal leaves. The stem leaves are stalked and alternate up the stems. They are pinnate leaves with 3 to 7 pairs. Leaflets are lance-shaped and large toothed. The leaves are more deeply toothed than...

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Alexanders

Flower: Yellow-green umbel. Fruit: Globular, ridged, turning black on ripening. Leaves: Yellowish-green bluntly toothed, divided and glossy.

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Four-leaved Allseed

Flower: The flowers are very small and appear inside forked heads. Fruit: The fruit is a near spherical capsule, just over 1mm in size. Leaves: A many-branched, hairless, winter annual plant with small oval to spoon-shaped leaves, in groups of 4 along the stems. Grows in sandy soils. In Britain, Four-leaved Allseed is most likely to be encoun...

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Allseed

Flower: The small white flowers are short-stalked and appear inside branched clusters. The 4 petals are about as long as the toothed sepals. Fruit: The fruit is a globular seed capsule. Leaves: A well-branched annual with very small, pointed oval leaves. The leaves are in opposite pairs along the stems. Greyish-green, stiff, thread-like, forked, reddish stems.

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Marsh Arrowgrass

Flower: A flower spike. The green flowers have purple edges. Individual flowers are up to 3mm wide. Flowers have 3 petals and 6 stamens. Fruit: Narrow, erect and arrow-like. Leaves: Long and grass-like leaves with deep grooves.

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Canadian Arrowhead

Flower: Flowers are in whorls of 3, each measuring approximately 1 inch across. The petals are white, tinged pink. 6 or more stamens. Pollinated by insects. Fruit: Globular fruit covered in hooked seeds. The fruit turns reddish as the seeds mature. Leaves: An aquatic perennial with submerged, broadly elliptical, long-stalked leaves, tapering to a point.

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Garden Asparagus

Flower: Bell-shaped, pale green or yellowish flowers. Pollinated by bees. Fruit: A small, red berry, up to 1cm across. The seeds ripen in September and October. Leaves: A perennial herb with an erect, single stem. The shoots are sometimes known as 'spears'.

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Wild Asparagus

Flower: Minute greenish-white or yellowish-white tubular flowers, appearing in 1's or 2's along the stems. Fruit: The fruit is a small red berry. Leaves: A long-lived perennial plant with no true leaves. Bluish-green, needle-like leaves in whorls along the stems. Leaves usually measure no longer than 2cm long.

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Goldilocks Aster

Flower: Loose, erect clusters of bright golden yellow flowers. They measure no larger than 1.8cm across. The yellow stigmas are prominent. Very late flowering. Fruit: The fruit is an achene. An achene is a type of dry, one-seeded fruit. Leaves: Numerous, linear, lance-shaped leaves. Unlike the similar looking Golden Samphire (Inula crithmoides), the leaves are not fleshy.

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Sea Aster

Flower: Pale blue/purple, sometimes white or yellow. The flower consists of 5 stamens and 2 carpels. Fruit: A flattened, hairy yellow-brown fruit. Leaves: A biennial or perennial plant with thin, dark green leaves. The leaves have a prominent central vein. Similar-looking to a Michaelmas Daisy.

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Mountain Avens

Flower: Solitary flowers which are stalked (3 to 10cm in length). Usually 8 petals (sometimes 7 to 10). At the centre of the flower are many golden yellow stamens. Flowers are each 4cm in diameter. Pollinated... Fruit: The fruit is a nutlet, attached is a long feathery plume. Leaves: A low-growing, prostrate, mat-forming undershrub with dark green, oak-like leaves. The undersides of the leaves are downy white. The upper surfaces are smooth and hairless. The stems are woody. Grows ...

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Meadow Barley

Flower: Compact, purple-tinted, flower spikes with long awns. The spikes are a maximum of 5cm long. The rough, bristle-like glumes are shorter than those of the similar looking Wall Barley (Hordeum murinum). Fruit: The fruit is a caryopsis. Leaves: A perennial grass which is shorter than the similar looking Wall Barley. Flat, rough, mid-green leaves, 5mm wide.

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Sea Barley

Flower: The spike is a maximum of 5cm in length. It has stiff, strongly spreading awns, up to 2.5cm long. Fruit: The fruit is a caryopsis. A caryopsis is a type of dry, one-seeded fruit. Leaves: An tufted, erect, annual species with glaucous, velvety leaves.

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Yellow Bartsia

Flower: The inflorescence is a leafy spike of flowers. Each flower has got a long 3-lobed lower lip. Fruit: A hairy, egg-shaped capsule. About 1cm long. Leaves: An annual stiff plant covered in sticky, glandular hairs. The broadly lanceolate leaves appear together in opposite pairs. The hairy leaves are toothed and unstalked.

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Annual Beard-grass

Flower: A dense, long, one-flowered spike (up to 15cm or 6 inches). The spike looks fluffy/silky and greenish-white due to its compactly-spaced awns (each up to 7mm long). Pollinated by the wind. Fruit: The fruit is a caryopsis. A caryopsis is a kind of dry, one-seeded fruit common in grasses. The seeds ripen from July to September. Leaves: An annual grass with typical-looking linear, grass-like leaves. Leaf blades are minutely hairy or hairless and about 6mm wide.

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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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Clustered Bellflower

Flower: A compact clustered flowerhead of violet-blue, unstalked, bell-shaped or star-shaped flowers. The petals are blunt-tipped and curve outwards. A faint dark violet vein runs through the centre of each p... Fruit: The fruit is a many-seeded capsule. Leaves: Dark green, narrow, lance-shaped leaves (or slightly heart-shaped), half clasping the stem. The leaves alternate along the stems on both sides. The lower leaves are triangular and stalked. Occasionall...

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Creeping Bent

Flower: Clusters of flower spikelets, usually awned. Spikelets have only one floret. Often purplish. Similar in appearance to Common Bent (Agrostis capillaris) but its flowerheads are less open. Wind pollinat... Fruit: A brown caryopsis (a type of dry one-seeded fruit). Leaves: A perennial grass with creeping runners. Flat leaves with long pointed ligules. Abundant all over the British Isles.

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Sea Bindweed

Flower: The pink flowers are trumpet-shaped with 5 white stripes. The centre of the flowers are yellowish. Flowers are between 3.5 and 5cm across. Insect pollinated. Fruit: A smooth, globular capsule, up to 2cm across. Leaves: Sea Bindweed is a trailing perennial plant with fleshy kidney-shaped leaves.

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Cut-leaved Blackberry

Flower: Flowers can be white or pink. The petals are deeply cut into 3 lobes at their ends. Fruit: The fruit is a black berry. The fruits are similar in appearance to blackberry. Leaves: A scrambling, half-evergreen shrub with very easy to distinguish leaves. The leaves are deeply cut. Prickly stems. A garden escape species.

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Virgin's Bower

Flower: Star-shaped white flowers. Fruit: The fruit is a green achene which is a kind of dry, one-seeded fruit. The fluffy seedheads ripen from October to January. Pollinated by flies and bees. Leaves: A deciduous climber with dark green 2-pinnate leaves, similar in appearance to Traveller's Joy (Clematis vitalba). In leaf from March to November.

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Brookweed

Flower: Flower spikes (racemes). Each flower has an inward bending long stalk and is about 2 to 4mm across. The bend in the stalk has a tiny, pointed bract. Triangular but blunt-pointed sepals. Orange heart-s... Fruit: Green globular fruit capsules containing many reddish-brown seeds. The seeds ripen from July to August. Leaves: A hairless, normally unbranched flower with pale green, fleshy, upright, spoon-shaped leaves. The oval leaves remain close to the stems. The basal leaves are the largest. The stem leaves are alternate...

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Butcher's Broom

Flower: Pale yellow or green flowers, up to 5mm across. Sometimes purple-spotted around the edges. The flowers grow out from the centre of the cladodes (see the section on leaf details). 3 petals and 3 sepals. Fruit: A red berry. The seeds are distributed by birds and ripen from August to March. Leaves: Butcher's Broom has no leaves. The leaf-like structures are actually flattened stems. These structures are called 'cladodes'. This plant is a low-growing evergreen shrub with oval cladodes that end in...

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Oxtongue Broomrape

Flower: Yellowish-white, purple-veined, downy flowers. Purple stamens. Fruit: The fruit is an egg-shaped capsule. Leaves: The green leaves are oblong or lance-shaped and toothed. The stems are purple-tinged. Oxtongue Broomrape is parasitic on Bristly Oxtongue (Helminthotheca echioides) and Hawkweed Oxtongue (Picris hiera...

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