Betony

While Pete and Chris were re-surveying the Stoke Rochford waterfall, I headed up to a stretch of the Grantham Canal near Denton to do some more recording for the BSBI 2020 Atlas. The most interesting finds were in arable areas, two large populations of Rye-brome (RDB Vulnerable) and a hedgerow with Hedgehog Bramble, only the second post-2000 record for VC53. It was wonderful to watch a very large number of Swifts feeding in the perfectly blue summer sky and swooping down to get drinks of water from the surface of the canal .
The afternoon was spent in the western half of the Saltersford Valley. Although much of the grassland has been improved the slopes still have good populations of Betony, Pignut, Dropwort and other neutral grassland species. I was surprised to see a Dark-green Fritillary nectaring briefly on the Betony - it then flew over to the other side of the valley, which is a LWS with some fine limestone grassland. Other highlights of the afternoon were large numbers of feeding Swallows and a fair few House Martins, not to mention watching three Ravens high overhead, spiralling on thermals, cronking to each other. And lots and lots of tiny froglets in the grass!