Uber plant challenge


I do like to have set aims at the start of each year - small projects if you like. They don't ever become all-consuming affairs, more like amusing side-shows. This year saw me adopt Priest Hill as a birding patch, which, at times, was rewarding. So what for 2018?

I first started to look at plants in earnest in 1998. I had dabbled before, mainly at Dungeness. The years that followed saw me get fully into all things botanical and culminated in far-flung trips to enjoy the best that Britain has to offer, from the mountain-tops of Scotland, to the Lizard peninsula coast, and the dry Breckland heaths. As much as I still regularly search for plants locally I have become lazy. My identification skills have lessened as I tend not to check difficult groups and have largely shied away from grasses, sedges and rushes. Well, that's where the 2018 project comes in.

My Uber patch (map above) will act as the defined area of my botanical year/challenge. I have broken this up into defined areas and will record the plant species recorded throughout the year in each one. This will make me critically examine groups several times over and restore my lost knowledge (and gain much more) - plus possibly add a few records to the Surrey Botanical Society data base. The checklists are primed, eye-lens cleaned, literature at the ready...

Comments

Derek Faulkner said…
What exactly is a Uber Patch, apart from somewhere you can catch a taxi?
10 December 2017 at 11:09
Steve Gale said…
A childish affectation of mine that is explained in one of the top tabs on this blog
10 December 2017 at 11:43
Derek Faulkner said…
http://www.dictionary.com/browse/uber
10 December 2017 at 11:57
Gibster said…
Looking forward to this almost as much as you are, Steve! Plenty of pics of awns, sheaths, culms, glume emarginations, sclerenchymas and other profoundly important features please! Hybrid Equisetum cross-sections could be useful too, many thanks in advance... :)
11 December 2017 at 01:29
Derek Faulkner said…
You've lost me, I'll leave you guys to it.
11 December 2017 at 07:30
Steve Gale said…
That's where I'm heading Seth...
11 December 2017 at 09:01
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