Canvey Wick and Beyond - A Bounty of Botany

Travellers Joy or alternative name Old man’s beard

This wild clematis is a beautiful plant with masses of creamy-white flowers followed by the much more prominent feathery seed heads, which have given it one of its many other names: old man’s beard. These last through much of the winter, festooning otherwise bare wayside hedges. Perhaps this is why the plant is also known as traveller’s joy.

Holly Blue Butterflies

The Holly Blue Butterfly is fairly common in England and Wales. It is a woodland and garden species. There are two generations a year. The first caterpillars hatch from eggs laid on Holly in the Spring. They feed on the Holly flower buds. Changing into butterflies in the late summer. These butterflies lay their eggs on Ivy where the second generation of caterpillars feed on the Ivy flower buds before making a cocoon for the winter.

Blackthorn tree a member of the Rose family and an ancestor of our garden Plums

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Clover Leaves

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Apple Tree

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Common Mallow, member of the Geranium family

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Clover or Vetch family

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Clover or Vetch Family

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PYRACANTHA (Firethorn) Large sprawling, vine like, thorny shrub. White flowers in spring, red or orange berries in fall and winter

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Sea Buckthorn is an ornamental prickly dediduous hedging plant

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Rosebay Willowherb, Perennial, spreading by seed and creeping, fleshy white rhizomes. When it is in flower in large clumps it makes a striking feature - this gives rise to name Fireweed when a large stand is viewed from afar.

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Mayweed

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Pink Clover

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Ragwart is a herb with daisy-like flowers. They are members of the Daisy family and are mildly poisonous usually avoided by cattle.

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Flower bud of the Parsley family

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Wild Carrot also known as Birds Nest or Queen Anne's Lace

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Buddleia

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Woody Nightshade, member of the potato family. Also commonly known as Bittersweet. The red berries are less poisonous than Deadly Nightshade, with which it is sometimes confused. It grows in a variety of habitats from shingle to scrub and woodland, flowering between May and September. The flowers are followed by glossy, oval berries which start green, turning to yellow and red when ripe. The berries are very poisonous.

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