After identifying that I needed to improve my botanical identification skills this year, I ended up becoming a little bit fixated with rare arable plants. I enjoy botany in general, but the arable fields and margins in particular have drawn me in many times this Summer.

For me, the draw of this plant community is borne out of a fascination with past times. A window into that golden time of natural abundance. A sort of day-dreaming of how the countryside looked before intensive farming; before the industrial revolution even. Before the heavy horses retired in their thousands, and before the widespread use of agricultural pesticides. Many of the plants I was seeking out were once common on arable land, but have been lost over vast swathes of the countryside, to make way for more “efficient” monocultural farming. Removal of field margins to maximise crop yield became the norm across the land, and agro-chemicals did away with these “weeds”. Now, such “weeds” are confined to well managed pockets of land often specifically with their conservation in mind, or confined to the fields of farmers who manage their land in harmony with flora and fauna.

Langley Vale is one such place which has stood the test of time, however. The rare arable flora here has survived and thrived with sensitive management. It is perhaps a testament to how these delicate plants can survive, when harsh agro-chemicals are absent, when field margins are kept and nurtured, and when carefully planned crop rotations enable these plants to flower. The species of arable plant found in a place depend on the soil. In this case, calcareous soil which undergoes routine disturbance, is home to plants such as sharp leaved fluellen, ground pine, night flowering catchly and narrow fruited cornsalad…

Part of this recent fixation may have been amplified by the discovery that some farmland very near my weekend home supports a significant number of different of rare arable plants. Just fifteen minutes drive away, was a botanical treasure trove I had passed by numerous times without investigating. I only discovered it by happening upon a local naturalist’s (Steven Gale – great thanks go to him) wonderful blog; full of hours and hours’ worth of dedicated observation and study – the more I read, the more I wanted to head down there as soon as I could to see what I might find. Steven’s blog is called North Downs and Beyond – it’s a fantastic source of local information and a very good read with brilliant photos.

On entering the first field at Langley Bottom, up the slope to my right, I immediately noted hundreds of common poppy, punctuated with rough poppies here and there. The species can be separated by their seed heads, which are each distinctive. The beautiful lilac coloured poppies are opium poppies.

Scarlet pimpernel were abundant, as were the incredibly understated field pansy in pastel shades of yellow and lilac. I only wish I’d got a decent photo of this little flower. It favours disturbed soils in general, so it’s a frequent find on arable margins and fallow fields; not rare but no less beautiful for it. Another frequent find was small toadflax, a hairy but delicate annual. Black bindweed was sprawling out across the bare ground like necklaces. Bumblebees and hoverflies were also visibly abundant, to no surprise. Common fumitory, a plant whose seeds are a favoured food of the threatened turtle dove, was growing in rampant sprawls.

 

 

 

As with many Summer days exploring the countryside, my water was running low so I had to cut this first visit short. But I was back in the cooler evening in search of more. I ventured further into the site, arriving in a field near Nohome Farm. These dead-nettles drew my attention; they were – I learnt – cut leaved dead nettle. The flowers are variable in their pink colours and the leaves are deeply toothed; more so than the similar looking red dead-nettle.

Returning on a very hot Saturday the following week, I was determined to find more botanical treats. Armed with more information on where to find various things, I was full of hope. I walked several miles around the site, and was amazed by both how quiet and peaceful, and how beautiful it was. You could be miles and miles from the busy Epsom Downs, full of dog walkers, kite flyers and people exercising horses. The only other person I saw that afternoon was a fellow botanist, in search of many of the things I was.

I was in search of two particular things at this point; narrow fruited cornsalad and catmint. Cultivated catmint is a common find in gardens, and as such, it can be found growing as a ‘garden escape’ in many places. It is famed for being irresistible to cats, and induces ecstatic behaviour when they’re exposed to it, often sold in pet-toys for this purpose. But it grows genuinely wild as a rarer plant on calcareous arable and disturbed land. On entering the field east of Nohome Farm I found a fabulous specimen.

I found many specimens of night flowering catchfly, another calcareous arable rarity. This fascinating plant owes its name to its practice of opening at night to release a strong fragrance alluring to night flying moths. The moths are the pollinators of this plant, feasting on the plentiful nectar within. The plant is superficially very similar looking to white campion but is hairier and sticky-feeling, with the closed petals’ undersides having a noticeable yellowish hue, clear to see as all the flowers were of course closed in the middle of the day. Regretfully this was another plant I neglected to get a decent photo of.

I could find no narrow fruited cornsalad in this field; I expect I overlooked it its delicate flowers and fine stems. The botanist I encountered, however said he had seen several fine field gromwell – around thirty plants. Now there’s a rarity, and a very beautiful one at that. This is a good example of something once a lot commoner. The gentleman did his very best to describe to me where to find it, and with a general idea of location, I set off in earnest.  Walking up the slope towards the racecourse, I entered a barley field. I thought I had searched the edge of it most fastidiously, but alas I found no plants that drew my attention. And before long, I realised I was back near my car in the village, gromwell-less.

I returned home to refill on water and information. I lamented my ‘gromwellessness’ to my arable correspondent, so he kindly gave me a very exact location. This is particularly lazy botany on my part, but at this point I really just wanted to see the flowers before I went on holiday and missed them.

Parking high in the village, I cut through some woodland to return to the barley field I’d supposedly scoured earlier. I looked and looked, and felt the frustration rising in my stomach again. And then, almost hiding beneath the fringes of bedstraw and grasses, I noticed a tiny white flower. There it was.

I started to notice more and more, and then the larger specimens. Goodness knows how I’d missed these proud beauties earlier. I counted around thirty individuals but may have overlooked further small ones hiding, like the first couple I spotted.

 

It then dawned on me I’d missed a lot of other gems in this exact spot earlier. I can only blame it on being distracted by the pain of my boots being full of sharp grass seed heads.

I began to notice this corner of the barley field was awash with other arable plants. There was the rare narrow fruited cornsalad I didn’t find near Nohome Farm. What beautiful delicate flowers. It’s possible to see how I may have overlooked these before, as they’re so tiny. Not short in stature, just very slender with tiny flowers, as you can see from the photo perhaps.

I then spotted field madder; lots of it! Another very pretty plant, from the bedstraw family. It’s another one that favours disturbed ground, meaning it’s often found in arable margins. Another arable gem was sharp leaved fluellen, spreading across the bare ground in massive profusion. I’d never seen so much of the stuff growing in one place.

From the prettily-named to the not so… nipplewort (lapsana communis). This oddly named and common plant gets its name from the nipple-like appearance of the closed flower heads, but.. I’m not convinced of the resemblance personally. Anyway this trait certainly can’t be seen from my awful photo.

My arable plant quest continued into Kent, once I’d returned from holiday. I’d read about the charity Plantlife’s jewel in the crown nature reserve, Ranscombe Farm.  A pesticide-free landscape of woodland, chalk downland and arable land in North Kent, this place is a wonderland of rare plants of all sorts. Apparently it is the last remaining site in the UK where corncockle, the archetypal arable plant of those former days of abundance, still grows naturally. As in, not cultivated as it is in many wildflower mixes planted on verges and field buffers today. I was headed in search of this pink flower in particular.

Soon after leaving my car I was impressed with the variety of plants in Longhoes field. Vipers bugloss, rough and common poppies, speedwells, stinking chamomile and various legumes. In this location I was after the broad leaved cudweed, and I was not disappointed. This nearest section of the field was full of it. It’s not the most dazzling looking plant, and it could be overlooked due to its dowdy appearance.

But it’s another truly rare arable field relic, so I was delighted with it. To see it growing in such great number too was proof of Platlife’s efforts to preserve this incredibly rare species. According to the charity, it is sadly now confined to only 8 sites in southern England.

 

 

Unfortunately, my visit to Ranscombe was cut short by finding myself suddenly ill, less than half a mile from the location of the corncockles. I had to trudge back over the downland to my car with what I suspected was food poisoning. By the time I could fit in my return to the site, the corncockles, and indeed wild liquorice I had hoped to find, would have gone over. They will have to wait for 2019. But what a fantastic reserve, a shining example of how a huge plethora of plants all in one place can be nurtured and protected.

My fascination with this botanical window into past times will no doubt continue. There is  something particularly special about this plant community that I find irresistible. Rarity and life-on-the-edge has a compelling pull, tinged with melancholy and nostalgia.  hearkening back to a time when the air was truly thick and noisy with insects. What’s more, it has completely whetted my appetite for studying botany across all plant communities that I’ve yet to familiarise myself with.

Thank you tremendously to all the contacts I’ve made who’ve pointed me in the right directions to see these wonderful plants. Often as a result,  I’ve made more discoveries than I expected. And thank you to those who have provided valuable and interesting information and tirelessly answered my questions.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It’s that quiet time of year when the avian cacophony of the hedges and fields has given way to the gentle thrum of grasshoppers and crickets. As Summer reaches its peak, the countryside seems to breathe its final sighs of butterflies and other insects in the margins and meadows. It has been a long season of relentless cloying heat and restless nights. The landscape has long since turned a shade of parched ochre.

This afternoon we spent a couple of hours exploring a network of fine old hedgerows and scrubby thickets on the Hampshire-Wiltshire border. Not that long ago this year, these hedges would have been chock-full of chattering sylvia warblers, blackbirds and dunnocks all staking their place. Now, above the buzz of insects, only a few insipid phrases from the bullfinches could be heard. The stage was now held by the butterflies.

 

Dominated by blackthorn interspersed with ash and oak standards, these hedges are home to a substantial population of brown hairstreaks. What butterfly year would be complete without viewing these rusty beauties? The female affords easy viewing; alighting on young blackthorn to lay her eggs, she creeps like a shark’s fin among the delicate stems, showing black and white stripy socks for legs. Brown hairstreaks are not a new species to me; but certainly not something I happen upon regularly. They are increasingly rare and limited in distribution, and like other hairstreak species, often overlooked due to a fairly unremarkable appearance in flight.

This site in the village of Shipton Bellinger, highly worthy of visiting to view butterflies, was a shining example of what a hedgerow rich in wildlife should look like. Metres and metres of thick, tall, scrambling shrubs dotted with large standards, stuffed full of bramble, wild clematis, hawthorn and blackthorn, tapering on each side to a herb rich edge full of legumes and scabious. And clearly very sensitively managed to ensure a constant supply of young blackthorn shoots for brown hairstreak egg-laying. A well managed hedge undergoes a careful and tailored cutting an/or laying regime to ensure it maintains its fullness, does not become overstood, and so it retains its variety of stages of succession. A hedgerow network such as this provides vital habitat linkage in the wider landscape.

Hedges of this kind will serve all sorts of wildlife throughout the year. Nesting and egg laying habitats for birds and insects alike in spring and summer, a multitude of nectar sources for insects, a larder of food for birds and mammals in Autumn and winter, and year round shelter from the elements for all sorts of wildlife. Even the deadwood layer at the bottom of it all provides hunting ground and refuge for frogs, toads, newts, beetles, woodlice….

The brown hairstreaks weren’t the only butterflies making use of the niches on offer. The wall brown butterfly, an increasingly coastal dweller, was spotted frequently alighting on the bare chalk earth. The bare ground which they love is maintained by continuous disturbance from footsteps and vehicle tyres. This in turn can also create conditions favoured by certain delicate plants like field pansy.

Second brood holly blues were a numerous sight; as well as nectaring on hedgerow plants, they could be seen creeping along the bare earth too, drawing minerals from the dry ground. Speckled woods dwelt in the dappled shade, and a painted lady jostled with buff tailed bumblebees for space on a small patch of buddleia. In the adjacent chalk downland, common blues, small heaths, meadow browns and the odd brown argus jinked from grass stem to flower head, many spiralling in pairs in mesmerising courtship flight.

The downland flowers stood resistant and stoic in the long-dry earth starved of rain. In set aside field margins and headlands, red bartsia dominated, interspersed with little field pansies and poppies. Many plants which favour calcareous soils are highly adapted to life on the dry and free-draining soil. Many, such as restharrow, have long roots for example.

In the afternoon, we left this glorious landscape behind for a glimpse of heathland. Like the hedge and downland, the birds here have gone about their quiet business as their breeding season draws to a close; only a few monosyllabic scratches from the Dartford warbler can be heard, or the passing pipes of a meadow pipit overhead. Again, insects and rare plants take centre stage.

Now, what butterfly year is complete without graylings? These are an earthly, mottled butterfly of exquisite camouflage, in their element on dry heaths and moors. Chobham Common is a site where they abound. On landing on the bare earth which is so important to heathland, they draw their forewing behind their hindwing, and it is as if they disappear. Blink and you’ll miss them, but follow them from flight to their landing spot and you’ll be rewarded with a picture of incredible camouflage. Sometimes their shadow is a giveaway. 

They have a peculiar predilection for denim. No, not wearing it like the brown hairstreak may wear her stripy socks, but.. alighting on denim clad legs. They appear drawn to the minerals from the sweat; and there’s plenty of that in our jeans on a hot high summer day. Fluttering around you, they then settle upon your leg and creep around in a spiralling climb. Butterflies are surprisingly revolting creatures. But their putrid preferences are often quite scintillating.

From the mottled and dull-coloured, to the colourful and glamorous; the ultimate reason I visited Chobham Common today. To look for these. Marsh gentians, I’d never seen them before. Wow…

They look so out of place in their setting. The boggy heath on which they grow is a scene of browns, gorse-yellows and heather-pinks typical of lowland heath. These blue trumpets look defiant and startling here. They are so beautiful. They’re a rare plant in the UK, with their stronghold in the New Forest. Chobham is the only site in Surrey where they now remain. I had wondered if the unusually dry ground here impacts their growth much. Looking at the tussocky vegetation amongst which the plants stood, you could see the area usually sits damp. But I expect the ground would long have been bone dry for some time. Perhaps they have a surprisingly fair tolerance to spells of drought? After all, boggy areas on heaths do sometimes dry out in extremes of weather, and the gentians continue to flower each year. Or will climate change eventually endanger the plant due to these boggy areas drying out too much? What are the limits of these striking plants, I wondered?

Almost a year ago, I stood in a field in deepest Wyoming, waiting for a moment. A moment that would last about two and a half minutes.

Nearly two weeks of travel through Southwestern Canada and the northwest of the USA had built up to this morning. I was suffering with the altitude, weary from regular 6am starts and parched from living in an air conditioned environment for longer than I’d ever had to before. And the sights and wildlife had wowed me a thousand times. I’d seen glaciers, towering peaks, crashing rivers and countless bald eagles.

On the 20th August, we’d arrived in Jackson, a small town nestled in the Grand Teton Range in Wyoming. This place had long ago been selected by experts as the prime viewing location for what we were due to witness. Nothing could fuck it up now. We’d come too far, literally. All the glory and grandeur of the Canadian Rockies, Yellowstone’s geisers, the herds of bison, the plains of northern Montana… would surely be sullied in memory by a cloud-out on the big day itself.

The scattered clouds were making us fractious. But the charismatic Doctor Mason had a reassuring calmness in his assertion that we’d have a first class viewing. The clouds would melt off in time.

When we got off the coach at the Snake River Ranch that morning, the altitude punched me in the chest once again. Almost two weeks of travel in close proximity to other people had also gifted me the mother of all colds. Combine a cold with high altitude and chances are you’ll feel pretty peculiar. But the excitement was mounting and I began to forget about how ill I’d been feeling.

As the minutes passed, telescopes, tripods, cameras and various other miscellaneous optical equipment amassed. The scattered clouds gradually gave way to an azure sky against the impressive Tetons – “proper mountains with sharp peaks”, as Paul had eloquently described them. It seemed that the world had descended on the small town of Jackson that weekend, but we had the fortune of a private viewing site holding just a few coach loads; plenty of space. People began to settle into their places, some with complex photographic equipment, and some – like myself – just with a basic camera and a sense of huge anticipation. Then, white sheets and various kitchen implements earnestly borrowed from hotel rooms were laid out like a strange jumble sale. Colanders were a favourite item.

If it’s your first time, you’re advised not to fixate too much on ‘capturing it’ photographically – rather, you’re to immerse yourself in the moments before, during and after. How the wildlife behaves in the lead up, how the shadows sharpen, how things look, how they feel. This was what I planned to do. I wasn’t after capturing pictures, I was here to indulge my senses and my soul. For this reason, I have no breath taking photos of the moment itself to show you. No photos of that climactic diamond ring. I was taking it in my stride, while Paul was anxiously pacing and counting down.

He was not, like I was, an eclipse virgin. He’d travelled to a remote Indonesian Island the previous year to witness one, but clouds had almost jeopardised the experience. Like many others, he’d become addicted to this moment of perfection in the universe. Trying to explain the pull of total solar eclipses had proven difficult for him – how could he explain this crazy desire to be in the immaculate shadow, time and time again, and to go to the ends of the earth to do so? It’s true; there are people who have travelled to any corner of the globe necessary to experience this moment of perfect alignment. The Libyan desert, Svalbaard, Hao… Those who do this are eclipse chasers.

I was about to become one. I was about to understand.

As the partial phases progressed, things around me began to happen, and things began to feel weird. Make no mistake, this is not just something you see with your eyes. It’s a full sensory experience. It’s almost trippy.

The sky slowly took on a deep feverish, inky blue colour, the contrast of the mountains augmenting this effect. Shadows began to lose their fuzzy edges and become completely pin-sharp. People were watching the shrinking crescents of the partial phases in the colander-holes, and projecting the shapes onto blankets. Then people’s faces began to look completely peculiar in a way I still can’t describe. You can see the shadows of people’s individual facial features, and pores and tiny features are highlighted. Pre-eclipse light is actually quite unflattering.

The light was simply bizarre. It’s not like dusk, it’s not like dawn, it’s not dingy, it’s not gloomy. It darkens but it’s not nocturnal. The closest thing I could possibly liken it to is wearing thick, cheap sunglasses on a sunny day just as a storm is brewing. By this time, I began to regret not bringing a coat. I hadn’t realised the temperature would drop so steeply and by so much. It had been about 27 degrees when we arrived, now it was about 10. I was starting to shiver. The changes in light and rapid drop in temperature aroused a strange feeling of uneasiness and excitement rolled into one. And then, the ground beneath me began to ripple and crawl at my feet. And on my clothes. And on Paul’s clothes. I was witnessing a phenomenon called ‘Shadowbands’. Thin wavy lines of light and dark that move across the landscape in the moments just before and after totality. I don’t know what they actually are, and it seems that not even scientists fully agree yet on what they are caused by. The phenomenon is usually best observed on flat white surfaces, hence the mass bed linen lay-out, however it was showing so strongly, that I could clearly see it happening just on the parched mottled ground. I couldn’t take my eyes off it until it abated…

…and gave way to totality.

As the sun and moon aligned, I gasped. Neon pink prominences glowed in the chromosphere, and ethereal streamers billowed out in a loose, whispy ‘Y’ shape. It was pure perfection. I watched both through my binoculars and with the naked eye, inbetween snatching moments of watching the silent crowd of awestruck folk, gazing into the inky, eerie sky. This scene – of people stood united in awe against the powerful mountains beneath totality – floored me. As totality approached its end, I brought my binoculars back up to gaze at that sultry chromosphere. I did not want to miss the climax.

As the end came, the diamond ring flashed before me like heaven had revealed itself. I think I cheered. It was as if a giant angel had opened a jewel box to his beloved, holding the most perfect token. I felt euphoria, and the euphoria in the people around me. I heard the people cheer, and applaud. I drank it in. It glowed white and perfect, until it was time to look away, and put the eclipse glasses back on.

Shadowbands appeared again. I soaked them in once more, fascinated by the ground beneath me shifting and playing with me. They were rippling on Paul, who was grinning down at himself, watching this perfect mystery crawling over himself. They faded, until the ground was still again. And we cheered, hugged, laughed. We appraised the eclipse with our new found friends. One chaser opened a carton of champagne and shared it around.

And then I just knew. I understood this shadow-bound wanderlust that pulls people around the earth. This gamble against clouds. You’re so entranced by this wonder that it flickers past you in such a brief moment, and then it’s gone. So you need to have it again. And again. The moment it was all over, I knew I had to see another one. I don’t know which one I’ll chase next. I just know that I’m not done with totality. How could one be?

Not all total eclipses give you the perfect shadowbands. And not all eclipses have good viewings, if they’re clouded out. Some don’t show bright, flashy, luminous prominences. Some are just… not as perfect as this one. But I had the whole bloody lot. As Paul said; “People spend years chasing total solar eclipses for glimpses of those features – for the perfect view of the chromosphere, the diamond ring, for the shadowbands before AND after… and they don’t see half of those things for several eclipses. Then you waltz in and see the whole gamut on your first go, unbelievable”.

Fellow humans, I highly recommend this experience.

 

 

 

 

What’s this? There’s a question I find myself asking very often, out loud, or inwardly. I’m inquisitive by nature and always have been. This trait is deeply ingrained in my lifelong natural history obsession. I have a constant need for information, knowledge and the fascinating. This can be quenched in any area of natural history – that is the beauty and immortal appeal of it – but currently this wonder is particularly manifesting itself in rockpools for me.

There is an undying magic in the draw of rockpools – microcosms of wonder exposed at low tide, weird and wonderful life forms trapped in small places until the tide takes them back away into the vastness of the sea. The big part of the pull of rockpools is the element of surprise; you never really know what you might find. What’s this? What actually is it? Is it simple or complex, is it vegetable or animal? For me, marine life is an area of my study that has remained until now, largely unexplored. I’ve devoted many hours of my life to lepidoptera, flowering plants, mammals, reptiles, birds, hemiptera – earthly things – yet the sea has remained quite unexplored as yet.

And so, I have devoted as much of my time as possible lately to rummaging about under rocks. Not enough time, since I do not live near a rocky coast and the ability to nip down to the shore at low tide to unearth the treasures of the littoral zones.

I did however make excellent use of my stay on Anglesey at the beginning of July. I had been hankering after this incredibly beautiful place – the island of my roots and best times of my childhood – for a few years, yet hadn’t seized any chance to go back. When I finally returned earlier this month, I immersed myself in smells, sounds and treasures of the coast. The flora and fauna of Anglesey is immense, and its rockpools are no exception. For an inquisitive soul like me, they are a wonderland.

One rather nice find quite early on in my foray, was this grey sea slug aeolidia pappilosa. I found it when I overturned a large boulder. When exposed, it resembled a gelatinious, amorphous blob that one could be forgiven for overlooking. Suspecting it may be a sea slug, I immersed it in some water to watch it ‘unfurl’, its cerata (the long frond-like protruberances on its body) becoming more visible. What a beautiful animal. I instantly loved it, and watched it for as long as I could. I also found some grey sea slug eggs nearby, not entirely dissimilar in appearance to brains! Apparently grey sea slugs are often found in rockpools, as they favour the intertidal zones.

Sea slugs, like terrestrial slugs are molluscs, an enormous and diverse group of animals. I’d say that sea slugs are a lot more fancy looking than terrestrial slugs, coming in all sorts of colours and shapes. I found another species back at Freshwater Bay on the isle of Wight in May – this absolutely dazzling elysia viridis – again, stuck to a rock in blob fashion, until I immersed it in water to watch it in its blue-speckled beauty. Regretfully I only got a photo of it in the latter state.

Back to the rockpools on Anglesey – I found numerous other animals stuck to rocks around the north and east of the island. My favourite may just be this cushion star asterina gibbosa. I stopped my car at a small cove near Trearddur Bay, the tide was coming in, so the rockpools were fairly high-littoral, but threw up two of these beauties.  Starfish, better named sea-stars, are not fish. They are echinoderms. Echinoderms possess several unique-to-the-animal kingdom characteristics, one being 5 or more ‘arms’ radiating from a central body. Anglesey is a good place to find them.

Flat topshells were numerous – these very attractive little gastropods can be found stuck to rocks like gems. 

Another find was this little rock goby. I find these quite often in rockpools; it’s the only fish, along with the shanny, that I tend to see a lot of. It ‘froze’ when I hovered above with my phone-camera.

Below’s picture is of a shanny, or common Blenny. It has numberous regional names, including sea-frog. It is so nicknamed due to its tolerance to being out of water for short spells, hence it comfortably sitting in my hand whilst I photographed it. Be careful handling these as they do have a nasty bite! They are very common in rockpools, often hiding in piddock-holes. Lift up a sizeable bolder, and you’ll likely have a few decent sized ones suddenly ‘leap out’ from underneath, trying to evade you. I think they’re pretty cute.

Also found stuck to the underside of several rocks were clutches of these weird-looking dog whelk eggs. You can see from the photo, some are hatched, some not. Dog whelks, like any other gastropod, are very benign in appearance; slow, cumbersome, ambling beings. When we think of predators, they certainly aren’t what comes to mind. This is where life gets wonderful and surprising and fascinating, for the umpteenth time. Carnivorous isn’t something most people would assume any gastropod to be, but dog whelks are indeed just that. Using  a specially modified part of its shell – a toothed radula – they bore holes in the shells of other molluscs, and release digestive enzymes from an organ in the foot (that’s the flat part of the gastropod), to sort of ‘dissolve’ the body of the animal inside. This goo is then slurped out through the whelk’s proboscis, and that is its sustenance.

When I first learnt of how dog whelks feed, it blew my mind a little bit. This is the wonder of the littoral zones and the wide sea beyond – surprises, incredible adaptations, colourful patterns, animals simple and complex alike. What miracles it holds. I am addicted.