The birch polypore only grows on Birch trees. This leathery bracket fungus has a rounded, coffee-coloured cap that was once used for sharpening tools, hence its other name: the 'Razorstrop…

The song thrush is a familiar garden visitor that has a beautiful and loud song. The broken shells of their blue, spotty eggs can often be found under a hedge in spring.

The fluffy, white seed heads of traveller's-joy give it the evocative, alternative names of 'old man's beard' and 'Father Christmas'. A climbing plant, it can be seen…

The adder's-tongue fern is so-named because the tall stalk that bears its spores is thought to resemble a snake's tongue. An indicator of ancient meadows, it can be found mainly in…

Annual meadow-grass is a coarse, vigorous grass that can be found on waste ground, bare grassland and in lawns. In some situations, it can be considered a weed.

Tormentil can be found growing on acid grassland, heathland and moorland, but even pops up alongside roads. It bears yellow, buttercup-like flowers, but with only four petals (buttercups have five…

Chinese water deer are easily distinguished from other deer by their strange teddy bear like appearance and the huge canine tusks displayed by the stags.

Sometimes called 'Wild spinach', Sea beet can be cooked and eaten. It grows wild on shingle beaches, cliffs and bare ground near to the sea, as well as in saltmarshes.

The grayling is one of our largest brown butterflies and a master of disguise - its cryptic colouring helps to camouflage it against bare earth and stones in its coastal habitats and on inland…

The black-tailed skimmer is a narrow-bodied dragonfly that can be seen flying low over the bare gravel and mud around flooded gravel pits and reservoirs. It is on the wing from May to August.