From spring, look out for the beautiful, speckled gold-and-black breeding plumage of the golden plover. It can be found in its upland moorland breeding grounds from May to September, moving to…

The hairy-footed flower bee can be seen in gardens and parks in spring and summer, visiting tubular flowers like red dead-nettle and comfrey. As its name suggests, it has long, orange hairs on its…

The dark bush-cricket, as its name suggests, is dark brown or reddish. It can be found in woodlands, hedgerows and gardens throughout summer. Its irregular chirpings are a familiar sound of summer…

One of the longest seaweeds native to the UK, thongweed helps create a beautiful underwater forest to rival that of any on the land!

The aromatic fragrance of Large thyme can punctuate a summer walk over a chalk grassland. It is an evergreen that grows low to the ground, with erect spikes of tiny, lilac flowers appearing over…

The whooper swan is a very rare breeding bird in the UK, but has much larger populations that spend winter here after a long journey from Iceland. It has more yellow on its yellow-and-black bill…

The large, fluffy caterpillars of this moth are often seen in summer and early spring.

Their long narrow shells are a common sight on our shores, especially after storms, but the animals themselves live buried in the sand.