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Anthoxanthum oderatum
Thin, wiry grass with short leaves and a spike of flowers at the top of the stem. Where the leaf meets the stem, there is a fringe of hairs which look like eyelashes.
On old meadows and grasslands that are often rich in wild flowers. Here, it’s one of the first meadow grasses to come into flower in the spring.
Red Fescue – another grass with a narrow stem and pointy flower spikes, but which is bigger and lacks the scent.
It gives out a scent that is THE distinctive smell of a hay meadow – somewhere between vanilla and almond. Some people like to chew the grass to get the taste of the scent.
Poa trivialis
At first glance, this looks like a typical grass. Quite tall, with its flat flowers hanging from the ends of short stalks, arranged along the stem like a Christmas tree. But rub your fingers along the fresh stem and you’ll notice it is slightly rough. Pull the leaf away from the stem a little bit and you’ll see a membrane-like triangle – known as a ligule, this is distinctly long and pointy on Rough Meadow Grass.
Rough Meadow Grass not only grows in all kinds of grassland, but also in marshes, ditches, wastelands and woodland glades. It’s also found on lawns but struggles to survive if mown regularly.
Don’t mistake it with
Smooth Meadow Grass looks very similar but lacks the roughness of the stem, and its ligule, that membrane at the junction of the stem and leaf, is not pointy in shape.
Just one plant of Rough Meadow Grass can produce up to 29,000 seeds, providing food for worms and ground beetles.
Lolium perenne
Its glossy dark green leaves shimmer as they waft in a breeze. Closer up, their spikey flowers cling close to the stem, barely overlapping. The stem turns a lovely burgundy red colour near the base of the stem.
For those with a keen eye, the leaves clasp around the stem with what look like a pair of hooked claws, known as an auricle.
Widespread across the UK, it’s particularly abundant in parklands, sports fields and freshly laid lawns. It is also the most commercially sown grass on farmland, cut a few times a year to provide winter food for cattle and sheep.
Couch Grass has spikey flowers that also cling close to the stem, but unlike Rye Grass, these overlap. Its leaves are grey-green and rather rough rather than the smooth feeling, dark and glossy leaves of Rye Grass.
As Rye Grass grows fast and is eagerly eaten by livestock, it was the first grass in Britain to be sown commercially on farmland, probably more than 400 years ago. Modern varieties are bred to be able to tolerate trampling, mowing and heavy grazing.
Holcus lanatus
This is easy! It has a soft, tall, hairy stems – just run your fingers along it. No other grass feels like this. The bottom of its stem looks like pink stripey pyjamas – no other grass looks like this. There are pink flushes too in its long flower head which look beautiful when swaying in the wind.
The most widespread of all grasses in the UK, it’s found on all kinds of grasslands, from meadows to wastelands. On lawns, it flowers a little bit later than other grasses during No Mow May.
Creeping soft-grass – its nearest relative is only hairy on its nodes, the lumpy bits along the stem that look like knees.
It can be a dominating grass as it produces huge amounts of seed which can germinate almost immediately, and buried seed remains viable for many years.
Dactylis glomerata
It’s one of the bigger lawn grasses which can grow over 1m. Its most distinguishing feature is its flattened lower stems which you can feel with your fingers as easily as you can see. Forming dense tussocks, it also has distinctive heavy-looking flower heads.
It’s found across the UK in all kinds of places but it’s most commonly found in meadows and roadsides. On lawns, it often grows on the lesser mown edges.
False oat grass – another tall, bulky grass which flowers slightly later.
Cock’s-foot grass is a surprisingly good plant for wildlife.
Leucanthemum vulgare
In bloom around the summer solstice, this large daisy is a sure sign that summer has arrived.
Each large flower is actually not just one flower, but many. The yellow centre is made up of lots of small yellow flowers, just like its smaller relative, the daisy.
The nectar from these flowers is an important food source for pollinating insects like beetles, bees, and butterflies.
The Oxeye daisy looks similar to the daisy but it is a much larger plant. It is taller, reaching a height of up to 70 cm, and its larger flowerheads can be up to 6 cm across. The base leaves are spoon-shaped and up to 8 cm long. The stem leaves are toothed and more oblong.
Oxeye daisy is a common plant that grows in grassy places. It can be seen in a variety of habitats, including grasslands, dunes, coastal cliffs, verges and waste ground.
In both urban and rural areas, the Oxeye daisy can be found lining roadsides in grass verges, making them a common sight for many during British summertime.
Centaurea cyanus
These bright blue flowers used to be classed as common arable weeds. Now they much scarcer.
Historically, the word ‘corn’ was used to mean grains such as wheat, barley, and oats. Cornflowers commonly grew amongst these arable crops, giving the plant its name.
The flowering plant is a distinctive bright blue colour. Cornflowers can grow to 90cm high, often rising above other plants. Their lower grey-green leaves are longer than their upper leaves.
There has been a dramatic decline in Cornflower numbers in the wild due to some modern agricultural practices.
Its populations began to recover in the late 1980s, particularly on unsprayed set-aside land and it is often included in wildflower replanting programmes.
Cornflower is found throughout the UK, though is rare in Scotland and Ireland.
It used to be classed as a common arable weed and could be found all over. However it is now seen a garden escape and more of a common sight in gardens that have been seeded with wildflowers.
In the wild, you will now find these flowers blooming in waste ground, scrub and road verges as well as some farmland.
Rubus fruticosus
Bramble is a rambling plant with delicate white or pink flowers which are followed later in the year by juicy blackberries. The stems have prickles and the leaves are hairy. Come autumn, its fruit is a widely recognised sight, turning from red to the near-black that gives them their name. Going ‘blackberrying’ is still a common practice today and one of the few acts of foraging to survive into the modern age. Bramble usually flowers in July and August, although its blossom has been known to appear in June. If it’s blackberries you’re after, they are usually adorning the branches in early autumn.
Throughout Britain, Bramble can be found in multiple habitats, including hedge banks, scrubland, woodland and waste ground.
As gardeners and walkers can testify, Bramble is doing well!
Silene dioica
Red Campion is a splash of pink commonly found on roadside verges in late spring and summer as the bluebells begin to fade. It is closely related to the rarer White Campion. Its deep pink flowers are 20mm across with notched petals on a softly hairy plant up to 1m tall. Opposite, it has oval, softly hairy leaves with hairy stems.
You can find Red Campion in lowland, shady sites, woods, hedge banks, scree and cliffs. It is a common sight along rural roadside verges.
Silene latifolia
White Campion is a common wildflower of grassland and waste ground. Its cheerful white flowers can be seen from spring to autumn.
The clear white flowers of the White Campion have five petals, each deeply notched and almost divided into two and its opposite, oval leaves and stems are hairy. In places where it grows with Red Campion, the two may hybridise to produce pinky white blooms.
White Campion grows on waste ground, disturbed roadside verges, hedgerows and well-drained arable field margins. It is in flower from May to October. It’s common throughout the British Isles, but has declined slightly at the western edge of its range.
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