The disappointment of the shiny black slag, and other stories

The Easter weekend provided a rare opportunity - a day with no commitments when I could do absolutely anything I wanted. Rather than spend the day locally I thought I'd take advantage of the chance to go somewhere further afield. But where could I go so early in the year where there would be interesting things to see? For no reason other than the fact that I'd noticed that Bristol Rock-cress was flowering at this time of year, I decided upon the Avon Gorge. I mentioned the plan to the Sussex posse and they were all up for it.

Warm sunshine greeted us upon our arrival at Durdham Down and one of the first things that we saw was a Hummingbird Hawk-moth. Before the trip, one of my friends had asked if there was any chance of seeing any of the rare whitebeams that occur in the Avon Gorge. I rather scathingly replied 'only if they've got labels on as they won't be identifiable without leaves'. So what do we find? Yep, the whitebeams had got labels on! The first one we looked at was the critically endangered Sorbus wilmottiana although all the subsequent ones were just Common Whitebeam.

While we were still trying to work out whether we were in the right spot, we came across a number of flowering Bristol Rock-cress.

Bristol Rock-cress Arabis scabra

In true pan-species style, we recorded a number of other species across a range of taxonomic groups that were new to one or more of the group, including the Nationally Scarce Lygaeid bug Rhyparochromus pini, the ant Temnothorax nylanderi, the pill woodlouse Armadillidium depressum, the moth Mompha miscella (larva mining the leaves of Common Rock-rose), Dwarf Mouse-ear, the rust Phragmidium sanguisorbae which is found on Salad Burnet and the galls on Red Valerian that are caused by the psyllid Trioza centranthi. It was also good to see the Dotted Bee-fly Bombylius discolor.

Dwarf Mouse-ear Cerastium pumilum

At lunch we decided to move on to another site. We had info on various (mainly non-native) plants that we all needed but the vote went to the Snake's-head Iris Hermodactylus tuberosus so we headed off to Sand Point. Whoever named this site needs to check the particle size of the soil here. Sand? What sand? Try Mud Point. We found the iris easily enough but it had finished flowering so we decided to head down to the point to see if there were any decent rock pools. There weren't but we did find Common Scurvygrass on the way.

Common Scurvygrass Cochlearia officinalis

The site didn't hold anything to inspire us so we decided to head off to a final site. On the way back from Sand Point we stopped for a mystery plant that we'd seen from the car on the way in. This proved to be Spring Starflower and we also picked up Sweet Alison Lobularia maritima at this stop.

Spring Starflower Tristagma uniflorum

Our final destination was a former lead mine where the target was Alpine Penny-cress Noccaea caerulescens. The directions told us to walk up from the car park and look for the shiny black slag from the old lead workings. We found this easily enough but the predicted 'plenty' of Alpine Penny-cress eluded us.

The shiny black slag, not looking very shiny in this photo

Nevertheless, a great day out to kick off the field season with some great company and some good cracks.