Brian Eversham

Welcome aboard! Good to see you here!

Country diary: A riverside walk reveals the city’s history written in plants | Susie White Lower Ouseburn, Newcastle upon Tyne: Under boardwalks, in concrete, on window ledges, seeds borne by water and carried on feet survive

In today's @theguardian.com country diary, Susie White checks out Newcastle's urban plants with James Common, whose new book - Urban Flora of Newcastle and North Tyneside - is out today! commonbynature.com/urban-flora-...

@bsbibotany.bsky.social #countrydiary #naturewriting

This is really excellent - the creation of a register of 'options over land' will help show if developers are land banking, and allow communities and councils to better understand who controls land in their area.

Good work @matthewpennycookmp.bsky.social & MHCLG Land team!

bsky.app/profile/matt...

Buglife News: Love Your Pet, Not Pesticides: New Report Warns of Flea and Tick Treatment Threat to Rivers Read more of our latest news related to invertebrates, insects and bugs.

A new report from wildlife charity Buglife reveals that pesticides from common flea and tick treatments are now widespread in rivers across Britain and may be contributing to major declines in freshwater invertebrates bit.ly/4b1Pu50

It could be a damaged nest of Median Wasp, Dolichovespula media, which often nests in hedges and bushes, but apparently can be at 'several metres' (15 is a very high 'several'!) bwars.com/wasp/vespida...

I signed up for this and spent a lovely sunny hour outside, yesterday, scrabbling about on the ground with my plant id book, trying to get decent photos for the recorder site.

Great for building my plant knowledge, less great for the hay fever! 🤣😷💜 #100Plants2026 #Wildlife #Wildflowers

Early Meadow-grass Poa infirma being its most obvious at this time of year, forming lime green patches on the edges of tracks, pull-ins by roads, carparks.. then check for a narrow inflorescence, non-branching culms, no purple in flowers and ovoid anthers - to separate from annua #wildflowerhour

I'm excited to be part of Watching Narrowly: A Natural History Book Day on Saturday 21 March at @gilbertwhites.bsky.social

I’ll be speaking as part of this celebration of nature writing in Selborne.

Join us in the heart of the South Downs!

Tickets available here: gilbertwhiteshouse.org.uk

For the price of a pair of binoculars, a whole new world www.flickr.com/photos/clado...

Pro growth rhetoric claiming to care about our suffering natural world 🦔 Britain Remade is a Tufton Street adjacent think tank that promotes building unfettered by environmental legislation

Huge congratulations James! So few urban Floras have been published this will be momentous. Can’t wait to get a copy and devour every page #UrbanFlora #UrbanPlants

I could try and say something relevant, topical, profound even on the general state of everything. However what I feel I need is a small, purple, Sea Lavender Weevil. So here it is. #Nature

World Book Day feels like the one day I’m allowed to say this without shame:

Buy my book. 🙈📚
Nature’s Acre — Irish garden memoir, wildlife-friendly, heart-first.

gardeningwell.ie/natures-acre

I see my job as conserving the raw material of evolution, so within-species genetics and patterns of former hybridisation (key to understanding elms?) matter. Now seeking funds for research into elms and insects, potential co-evolution of phytophages on trees which have themselves changed rapidly.

Oh squeak! It’s official publication day!

Tomato leaves with late blight caused by Phytophthora infestans

Hello friends of science! I’m migrating over here from X. There, I had 3,000 followers enjoying plant pathology content! Please help me rebuild. I’ll post plant disease photos, management info, science & nature content. Kicking off with some tomato late blight caused by Phytophthora infestans.

Data

I've suggested to my BBC colleagues we should tell the story of Lysenko, because the parallels are so strong - the career revenge inflicted on disfavoured scientists, the long-term harm to a core discipline. I've been surprised even among researchers, the story is only vaguely known.

Author interview with Peter Sutton: Field Guide to the Grasshoppers and Allies of Great Britain and Ireland The Bloomsbury Wildlife Guides series has consistently set the standard for invertebrate identification, combining practical, readable text with meticulous illustrations by Richard Lewington. The late...

www.nhbs.com/blog/author-...

Technocapitalists’ great trick is to make people who hate all this bullshit feel like they’re suffering from the same fogeys-not-coping-with-a-changing-world syndrome every generation succumbs to, rather than, say, just rejecting a rampant evil that seeks to rob us of our individuality and soul.

We are laying out The Fenland Flora by Owen Mountford & Jon Graham - this landmark 1600-page 2-volume set is due for publication this Autumn. Pre-publication offer will start late Spring @bsbibotany.bsky.social @plantlifeuk.bsky.social
Watch this space for updates on progress

Fragaria vesca, Wild Strawberry, Invert Associates
Native of woods, scrub & hedgerow, embankments & road verges, an important element of the ground flora. It supports 51 species of invert as a larval host, of which 14 are Coleoptera, 30 Lepidoptera.
📷 CAM Lindman, Bilder ur Nordens Flora
🌱

Cambridgeshire MP to introduce bill to protect UK chalk streams The 10-minute bill is set to go before Parliament on 25 February.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/article... ⬇️

Did you know that the bees that need saving are NOT honeybees?

Honeybees are the dairy cows of bees. People brought them over from Europe to make us honey.

The problem with honeybees, esp in resource-limited ecosystems (like hey! cities!) is that they compete with our native bees for food.

‘I love midges because I know what their hearts look like’: is the passion for taxonomy in danger of dying out? Insect taxonomist Art Borkent has described and named more than 300 species of midges but fears his field of science is dying out, despite millions of insects, fungi and other organisms waiting to be discovered

‘I love midges because I know what their hearts look like’: is the passion for taxonomy in danger of dying out?

And I should have said, if you like it, buy the book! bsky.app/profile/grae...

What is Pan-Species Listing (PSL)?

A challenge to record every UK species you’ve seen in your lifetime – across ALL wildlife groups. It’s holistic, flexible & grows with your skills.

Join our FREE entoLIVE with Graeme Lyons on 13 May to learn more.

Sign up: www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/1977266072...

Ulmus , Elm, seedlings 10 days after germinating, from Bedford Purlieus DSC_7156

Very similar to British elms too www.flickr.com/photos/clado... (still need to identify the parent tree!)

The Church of England is still treating gay people as second-class citizens Bishops voted 34-0 to block gay couples from being blessed in standalone ceremonies. At what point do we call this discrimination?

The Church of England is still treating gay people as second-class citizens, and at what point do we call this discrimination, writes Alan Rusbridger