Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist
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badbotanist.bsky.social
Emma Creasey - Bad Botanist
@badbotanist.bsky.social
120 followers 24 following 32 posts
Amateur botanist and conservation volunteer. She/her.
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badbotanist.bsky.social
This plant popped up in my garden. I didn't know it and have found it's Fagopyrum esculentum - Common buckwheat, presumably dropped from the bird feeder. In my ignorance, I had assumed 'buckwheat' was a cereal crop in the grasses family, like ordinary wheat... now I know! #WildflowerHour
A cluster of white flowers held amidst heart-shaped green leaves.
September 7, 2025 at 7:12 PM
badbotanist.bsky.social
Carlina vulgaris - Carline thistle, on a parched hillside. Is it alive? Is it dead? With Carline thistle, who knows? Looks the same either way. #WildflowerHour
Pale brown daisy-like flowers above brown spiky leaves growing in parched brown grass. It looks like a sepia toned image but that's the real colour I promise!
September 7, 2025 at 7:08 PM
badbotanist.bsky.social
Out at Avon Wildlife Trust's wonderful reserve at Walborough this week to count Autumn Lady's-tresses, Spiranthes spiralis, on a very windy hillside above the saltmarsh. Despite how dry it's been I think we got nearly 300. #WildflowerHour
Two Autumn lady's-tresses orchids, tiny plants a finger high, green spirals dangling tiny white bells, push up through the parched grass on a hillside. In the background is a flat green saltmarsh and beyond that the sea. Two Autumn lady's-tresses orchids, green stalks bearing segmented green spirals dangling tiny white bells. A tiny Autumn lady's-tresses orchids, the twisting flowers covered in a down of tiny white hairs.
September 7, 2025 at 7:02 PM
badbotanist.bsky.social
Yes, that looks like it to me - I have compared to some of my photos from Purn Hill, North Somerset, which were all taken in April and May.
Honewort (Trinia glauca) - pink stems, needle-like leaves, heads rather like a cauliflower. More frothy white and frondy green Honewort
June 22, 2025 at 8:35 PM
badbotanist.bsky.social
Alas, no aquatic plants at Farmoor reservoir (too many birds, fish and boats!) but lots of terrestrial ones for me and mum to see round the (nice, flat, wheelchair-friendly) path including Large-flowered Evening Primrose, Mugwort and a fine Pyramidal Orchid.
#WildflowerHour
Large-flowered Evening Primrose (Oenothera glazioviana) with, well, large, blowsy, yellow flowers! Growing on a dry grassy bank with reservoir in the background. Common Mugwort (Artemisia vulgaris) - slender white fronds of flowers showing up against dark water behind. A fine Pyramidal Orchid (Anacamptis pyramidalis) - looking more cylindrical than pyramidal, rather like a raspberry ice cream lolly. My mum, an old lady in a wheelchair, wearing a sunhat, contemplating the Pyramidal Orchid with the reservoir in the background.
June 22, 2025 at 5:07 PM
badbotanist.bsky.social
Common Field-speedwell (Veronica persica) poking through a school fence, and Musk Mallow (Malva moschata) growing alongside litter smack in the middle of a road, on the crossing island

#WildflowerHour #UrbanPlants
A tiny bright blue and white flower striped with darker blue pokes through green wire netting Big frilly pink flowers and leaves like delicate green lace grow out of dead leaves and litter next to a concrete barrier and metal railings
June 15, 2025 at 8:23 PM
badbotanist.bsky.social
look at this absolute unit

Giant Hogweed next to the River Frome as it comes into the centre of Bristol

For carrot family comparison, next to it is an ordinary Hogweed trying to look big and realising its mistake, plus Hemlock Water Dropwort trying to hide
#WildflowerHour #UrbanPlants
Giant Hogweed, Heracleum mantegazzianum. Massive white umbrella-like flowers and huge spiky leaves growing next to a grey wall. Couldn't possibly look like anything else as nothing else looks this much like a Triffid that is considering eating you. A lot of green plants growing near a riverbank, including the white frothy flowers of Hogweed, Hemlock Water-dropwort and Giant Hogweed towering over them all.
June 15, 2025 at 8:11 PM
badbotanist.bsky.social
Meadow vetchling (Lathyrus pratensis), Spotted Medick (Medicago arabica), White Clover (Trifolium repens) and Lesser Trefoil (Trifolium dubium) found on a rather damp #PeaFamily hunt.

#WildflowerHour
Meadow vetchling, Lathyrus pratensis, a bouquet of yellow flowers held delicately at the end of a long stem. Spotted Medick, Medicago arabica, a little yellow flower surrounded by wide green leaves each with a heart-shaped brown spot in the centre. White Clover, Trifolium repens, being unnecessarily dramatic, rising out of the grass stems like the White Queen from a stage trapdoor. Lesser trefoil, Trifolium dubium, tiny bunches of yellow flowers amongst equally tiny leaves.
June 8, 2025 at 4:45 PM
badbotanist.bsky.social
I always think that navelwort or wall pennywort (Umbilicus rupestris) looks as if it has come in costume straight off a Dr Who set.

#WildFlowerHour
An old stone wall out of which is growing the most extraordinary plant consisting of beaded spiky cones and round fleshy leaves. If you've seen Dr Who monsters from the 1970s, it looks like that.
May 25, 2025 at 7:02 PM
badbotanist.bsky.social
Purple Toadflax (Linaria purpurea), Red Valerian (Cetranthus ruber) and Beaked Hawk’s-beard (Crepis vesicaria) peek cautiously through a gate to see their friends on the other side.
#WildFlowerHour #WildFlowerShow
Purple, pink and yellow flowers grow next to an old farm gate. The concrete drive on the other side is getting overgrown by pink and white flowers.
May 25, 2025 at 6:58 PM
badbotanist.bsky.social
Long abandoned garage door at Avon Wildlife Trust’s new purchase, Ebdon Farm. Now ivy curtains frame a #WildFlowerShow of Oxeye and Common daisies, Mexican fleabane, Red Valerian and Beaked Hawk’s-beard. #WildFlowerHour
A once very ordinary buff coloured garage door is now beautifully framed by green ivy curtains and in front of the door is a riot of pink, white and yellow flowers. Clearly no one has opened this garage for a very long time!
May 25, 2025 at 6:51 PM
badbotanist.bsky.social
Also peeping through the #NoMowMay grass:

Herb Robert (Geranium robertianum)
Lesser Trefoil (Trifolium dubium)
And the first flowers of Yellow Rattle (Rhinanthus minor)

(2/2)
@plantlifeuk.bsky.social
#WildflowerHour
A tiny five-petalled pink flower of Herb Robert, with frilly leaves. The even tinier yellow flowers of lesser trefoil, dwarfed by grass blades. The emerging flowers of Yellow Rattle looking like little cheeping budgies.
May 18, 2025 at 2:42 PM
badbotanist.bsky.social
Update from my mini meadow during #NoMowMay.

Meadow Buttercup (Ranunculus acris) with friend, a Thick-legged Flower Beetle (Oedemera nobilis)
Beaked Hawksbeard (Crepis vesicaria)
Mouse-ear Hawkweed (Pilosella officinarum)

@plantlifeuk.bsky.social
#WildflowerHour

(1/2)
Bright yellow buttercup with a shining green beetle sitting in the flower. A spray of cheerful yellow flowers, Beaked Hawksbeard. Lemon yellow flower with red striping on back, and hairy stem; Mouse-ear Hawkweed.
May 18, 2025 at 2:42 PM
badbotanist.bsky.social
#PinkFamily flowers seen this week - Common Mouse-ear (Cerastium fontanum), Red Campion (Silene dioica) and Ragged Robin (Silene flos-cuculi). #WildflowerHour
Common Mouse-ear - one tiny white flower and several buds amongst blades of grass. Red Campion, intensely pink flowers with an inflated dark pink calyx behind them. Ragged Robin, pale pink flowers looking very straggly and upset and worse for wear - but they're supposed to look like that!
May 18, 2025 at 2:13 PM
badbotanist.bsky.social
I have been doing #NoMowMay (and June, July, August... and actually up to April if I miss the late autumn cut) since 2019 on my front 'lawn'. I sowed a handful of yellow rattle seeds... 5 plants came up in 2020... now they are everywhere! Look forward to seeing them!
@plantlifeuk.bsky.social
A grass-level view across a cheerfully messy lawn topped with lots of round fuzzy dandelion seed heads Lots of tiny leaves coming up amongst the soon-to-be-parasitised grass blades A shoot coming up with ridged leaves - a St John's Wort White flowers striped with indigo, this is Veronica serpyllifolia, Thyme-leaved Speedwell, dwarfed by the grass blades and clover leaves surrounding it.
May 3, 2025 at 3:52 PM
badbotanist.bsky.social
Capsella bursa-pastoris, Shepherd's Purse, in the evening sun
#WildflowerHour #CabbageFamily
White flower with heart shaped seed pods
April 27, 2025 at 6:03 PM
badbotanist.bsky.social
Bittercress, but I don't know if it's wavy or hairy... seems a bit personal to ask

#WildflowerHour #CabbageFamily
April 27, 2025 at 2:08 PM
badbotanist.bsky.social
Barbarea vulgaris (Common wintercress) cheering up a car park.

#Wildflowerhour #CabbageFamily
April 27, 2025 at 2:02 PM
badbotanist.bsky.social
Green and overlooked but still important #WoodlandPlants - Wood sedge (Carex sylvatica) and Dog's-mercury (Mercurialis perennis).

#WildflowerHour
White wiggly-hairy inflorescence of Wood Sedge Quietly green leaves of Dog's Mercury
April 6, 2025 at 7:41 PM
badbotanist.bsky.social
Compare and contrast the Ranunculaceae - glorious Marsh Marigold (Caltha palustris) in a local pond and, trying to emulate its bigger cousin, Lesser Celandine (Ficaria verna) are #WoodlandPlants but are nearly tumbling into the brook

#WildflowerHour
The big buttery yellow flowers of Marsh Marigold against a surface of brown water. A cascade of bright yellow stars of Lesser Celandine flowers growing on a steep bank above a brook.
April 6, 2025 at 7:22 PM
badbotanist.bsky.social
Of course, #WoodlandPlants would not be complete without bluebells! This one has a couple of tiny friends aboard.

#WildflowerHour #WoodlandPlants
The many blue and purple hues of bluebell flowers dangling off their stem which is bent over. Close up, there is a tiny fly on one bluebell and a tiny spider dangling between another two.
April 6, 2025 at 7:14 PM
badbotanist.bsky.social
A couple of early bloomers, the only one of each I could find in my local wood - a shyly peeping Wild Garlic (Allium ursinum) flower and a roaring Lamium galeobdolon (Yellow archangel)

#WildflowerHour #WoodlandPlants
Two flowers of Wild Garlic emerging like white stars Yellow flowers of Yellow Archangel look like lions' mouths agape and roaring
April 6, 2025 at 7:06 PM
badbotanist.bsky.social
Wood anemones (Anemone nemorosa) looking prettily picturesque in the sunshine this week.

#WildflowerHour #WoodlandPlants
A cluster of wood anemones in front of a fallen log in bright sunshine. Two white wood anemones on a background of green leaves.
April 6, 2025 at 6:55 PM
badbotanist.bsky.social
Pruning my hazels gave me a close look at their anemone-like flowers. #WildflowerHour
A close up of a brown hairy twig with three green buds one of which has what looks like bright pink tentacles coming out of it. This is a hazel flower.
February 9, 2025 at 8:13 PM