Red valerian was introduced in the 1600s from Europe, but is now naturalised in the UK. Its pinky-red flowers grow from old walls, roadside verges, railway cuttings and cliffs, and provide nectar…

A fleshy herb of the wet margins of brooks, streams and ditches, Brooklime can be seen all year-round and provides shelter for tadpoles and sticklebacks.

Introduced from Japan in the 19th century, Japanese knotweed is now an invasive non-native plant of many riverbanks, waste grounds and roadside verges, where it prevents native species from…

Water figwort is a tall plant of riverbanks, pond margins, damp meadows and wet woodlands. Its maroon flowers are pollinated by the Common wasp.

The delicate, tube-like, violet-blue flowers of Skullcap bloom from June to September in damp places, such as marshes, fens, riverbanks and pond margins.

The elegant little egret was once a rare visitor to our shores, but can now regularly be spotted around the coastline of England and Wales. Look out for its beautiful neck plumes that herald the…

These non-native limpets arrived from America in the 19th century and are now widespread in the UK. They form stacks and have a specially adapted shell which, when flipped upside down, looks like…

A key species in the story of conservation, the avocet represents an amazing recovery of a bird once extinct in the UK. This pied bird, with its distinctive upturned bill, can now be seen on…

The puss moth is a large and fluffy moth, with a very strange looking caterpillar.