The wigeon is a colourful duck that can often be spotted wheeling round our winter skies in large flocks. A dabbling duck, it surface-feeds on plants and seeds in shallow waters.

A fluffy-looking grass of rough grassland, roadside verges and disturbed ground, False oat-grass is very familiar and often overlooked; in fact, it can help to stabilise dunes and shelter small…

Bell heather is our most familiar heather. In summer, it carpets our heaths, woods and coasts with purple-pink flowers that attract all kinds of nectar-loving insects.

The brimstone moth is a yellow, night-flying moth with distinctive brown-and-white spots on its angular forewings. It frequently visits gardens, but also likes woods, scrub and grasslands.

The lime hawk-moth is a large, night-flying moth that can be seen from May to July in gardens, parks and woods. It is buff-coloured, with green patches on its scalloped-edged wings.

As its name suggests, the Marsh violet likes damp spots, such as marshes, bogs and wet woods. It is a low-growing plant with kidney-shaped leaves and pale lilac flowers.

The wayfaring-tree is a small tree of hedgerows, woods, scrub and downland. It displays creamy-white flowers in spring and red berries in autumn, which ripen to black and are very poisonous.

The harvest mouse is tiny - an adult can weigh as little as a 2p piece! It prefers habitats with long grass, but you are most likely to spot its round, woven-grass nests.

The brown, oval, spiky seed heads of the teasel are a familiar sight in all kinds of habitats, from grassland to waste ground. They are visited by goldfinches and other birds, so make good garden…

The river lamprey is a primitive, jawless fish, with a round, sucker-mouth which it uses to attach to other fish to feed from them. Adults live in the sea and return to freshwater to spawn.