Identifying Wildflowers

The Golspie area has proved rich in wildflowers this summer. Early on, every time we walked out there were new flowers to identify and to record on the Golspie Wildflowers page - it's here, but it's also accessible through the link in the blog's right-hand column.

Some of the wildflowers were easy to identify, particularly as we have three good books to help us, one of which is Keeble Martin's classic 'Concise British Flora in Colour'. This is an example, crowberry, found yesterday on the open moor to the north of Beinn Bhraggie.

Some proved much more difficult to pin down, as exemplified by this pretty plant, which gave up its secret only after we'd crushed and smelt a leaf: it's spearmint.

Foreign invaders have been another problem. This flower, on a plant that is well over a metre tall, is elecampane, horse heal, or elfdock, which came originally from Spain and warm points east.

Then there are the identifications which are tantalisingly close, like this one. I'm fairly, but not totally sure that this is great mullein, Verbascum thapsus. It would have helped if I had taken a photograph of its leaves and, because I only set about identifying it some weeks after we found it, if I had made a record of where I found it so I could go back and take another look.

Finding so many wildflowers has provided us with a welcome challenge but also, since so many of them are so beautiful, a great deal of pleasure. I look forward to next summer and finding yet more.