A handsome fish, the tench has olive-green flanks, powerful fins and distinctive red eyes. It can be found in lowland lakes and slow-flowing rivers around the UK.

The turkeytail is a very colourful bracket fungus that grows throughout the year, but is at its best in the autumn. Its circular caps can be seen growing in tiers on trees and dead wood.

Water-cress has become so popular as a salad addition that it is now cultivated on a wide scale. In the wild, it grows in shallow, fast-flowing streams and is an indicator of clean water.

The UK hosts a small, but important, breeding population of ruff. The ruff is a large sandpiper that is so-called due to the large ruff of feathers around the males' neck. This is used in a…

The pretty-in-purple amethyst deceiver can be seen growing in the leaf litter of our woodlands during late summer and autumn. Although edible, it looks similar to the poisonous Lilac fibrecap.

The bronze-coloured bream can be seen gathering in large shoals in lowland ponds, lakes and slow-flowing rivers. It is a member of the carp family and looks similar to the dace, chub and rudd.

Unsurprisingly, the chalkhill blue can be found on sunny, chalk grassland sites in southern England. Clouds of this beautiful blue butterfly may be seen fluttering around low-growing flowers.

Often seen carpeting the floor of ancient woodlands, Dog's mercury can quickly colonise, its fresh green leaves shading out rarer plants. It is also very poisonous.

As its name suggests, giant hogweed it a large umbellifer with distinctively ridged, hollow stems. An introduced species, it is an invasive weed of riverbanks, where it prevents native species…