Timothy is a grass of meadows, arable land, waste ground and roadside verges. It is also cultivated as fodder for livestock. Look for slender stems and long, cylindrical flower spikes in summer.…

An easily overlooked orchid, the Common twayblade is yellow-green and less showy than other UK orchids. Look for it in woodlands and grasslands on chalky soils, in particular.

As its name suggests, Sea spurge is found at the coast. It is an attractive plant that displays cup-shaped, greeny-yellow flowers and fleshy, grey-green leaves.

A late-flowering plant, Autumn gentian displays pretty, mauve, tube-like flowers atop its reddish stems. It favours dry, chalk grassland and sand dune habitats.

Cushions of clover-like, pink Thrift are a familiar sight of cliffs, shingle beaches and sand dunes around the UK. Also known as 'Cliff Clover', it makes a good garden plant.

As its name suggests, the large skipper is bigger than the similar-looking small skipper! It can be seen in summer, resting on the long grass of grasslands, woodlands, verges and sand dunes.

The garden tiger is an attractive, brown-and-white moth of sand dunes, woodland edges, meadows and hedgerows; it will also visit gardens. In decline, it is suffering from the 'tidying up…

A plant of chalk and limestone grasslands and sand dunes, Yellow-wort has butter-yellow flowers. Its distinctive leaves sit opposite each other, but are fused together around the stem.

Our largest shieldbug, the red-and-green hawthorn shieldbug can be seen in gardens, parks and woodlands, feeding on hawthorn, rowan and whitebeam. The adults hibernate over winter.

An attractive, green-and-yellow bird, the siskin regularly visits birdtables and feeders in gardens. Look for the bright yellow barring on its black wings, and the black crown of the males.