This elegant tern is named for the rosy flush to its summer plumage. With just one regular nesting colony, it is the rarest breeding seabird in the UK.

The whinchat is a summer visitor to UK heathlands, moorlands and open meadows. It looks similar to the stonechat, but is lighter in colour and has a distinctive pale eyestripe.

Piddocks are a boring bivalve. No, we don't mean dull... we mean that it bores into soft rock, creating a burrow. In fact, they're the opposite of dull - they glow in the dark!

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…

Looking a bit like a ragged version of a dandelion, mouse-ear hawkweed has lemon-yellow flower heads that are tinged with red at their outer edges. It likes grassy places with short turf and…

Sea-buckthorn is a spiny, thicket-forming shrub of sand dunes. It's native to the east coast of England but considered an invasive species elsewhere. It is most obvious in autumn when it is…

The water vole is under serious threat from habitat loss and predation by the American mink. Found along our waterways, it is similar-looking to the brown rat, but with a blunt nose, small ears…

In summer, the 'frothy' flowers of lady's bedstraw can carpet the grasses of meadows, heaths and coasts with yellow and fill the air with a sweet, honey-like scent.

Listen out for the 'chattering' song of the reed warbler, while wandering the UK's lowland wetlands in summer. A small, brown bird, they are quite hard to see.