Plants of Skye, Raasay & The Small Isles

I shall probably not add anything to this blog until the New Year.  Season’s Greetings!

I had forgotten that these had already been published in BSBI News of September 2009.  The ones of local relevance are:

Chrysanthemum (Glebionis) segetum (Corn Marigold)

Polystichum lonchitis (Holly Fern)

Sibbaldia procumbens (Sibbaldia)

The first is largely restricted these days to introductions of various sorts – imported soil for roadworks or planting of wild flower seed mixes – except on Muck where it is abundant in arable fields.

The second is local but with well-known sites.

The third is also local but with some of the sites poorly defined and this is the one that is likely to take most effort.

There has been a lone whooper swan on the sea in front of the house for two weeks now.  I am beginning to think it will stay for the winter though I had hoped it would find others of its kind.   Last year there was a lone one for about a week.  I counted 13 red-throated divers on the sea too recently.  I am used to seeing them in pairs (plus young when present) on lochans.

My friend Calum who has taken me to Rona so often in recent years has sold his boat this summer which means an end to easy trips to Rona. I can get to Scalpay in my own little boat and maybe if done in two stages I could get to Rona and stay in the bothy.

Over the winter I shall add another page to my Flora of Raasay and Rona listing plants in taxonomic order and linking each to its main entry.  Unique visitors since I started the counter now stand at 475.

I have sent away my records for the Threatened Plants Project.  I expect to be told the identity of the 2010 target species at the Scottish Annual Meeting of BSBI in Perth tomorrow,

The Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh is running a Certificate in Practical Field Botany course on Eigg next year and I have promised help with provision of known records – in return for which I hope to gain some new ones!  On a recce for the course in September, Heather McHaffie spotted some proliferative Cynosurus cristatus (Crested Dog’s-tail):

Proliferative Cynosurus on Eigg Photo: H McHaffie

According to the new BSBI Grasses Handbook such specimens are “common late in the season”.

I think I have found the source of my wood-boring beetle – an old desk once in Raasay Primary School used in more recent years as a saw-bench.  It has been burned!