Sarah Gibson

Some 35 years ago my mother collected handfuls of wild daffodil bulbs, thrown up by the plough on a neighbouring field in Dorset, which was then cultivated for maize. She planted them in a dingle on her own land, where they multiplied each year. She gave me a few for my garden and I love them.

First sighting of 2026 of the crimson, female flower of hazel: the nearest thing to a sea anemone in landlocked Shropshire. #WildflowerHour

Now with picture...

The glossy, leathery leaves of spurge laurel act as umbrellas, the fragrant flowers hanging down to avoid catching raindrops. Petty spurge flowers are like tiny, pale suns, the dandelion soaking up a ray of afternoon sun. Primroses and stinking hellebore herald spring! #WildflowerHour

Blackbird singing in the rain.

Swift bricks to be installed on all new buildings in Scotland as MSPs back law Rest of UK has resisted calls to make builders install bricks that provide nesting for swifts and other endangered birds

Great news from Scotland www.theguardian.com/environment/.... Now England must follow.

Ancient oak on the Shropshire/Wales border. It would take four people with their arms outstretched to give this tree a proper hug. #fattrunkTuesday

Snowdrops and scarlet elfcups growing in Llanforda woods among the ruins of Edward Lluyd's house.

"No sight ever pleases me so well as the snowdrops now in the wilderness," wrote the renowned botanist Edward Lloyd in 1668, referring to his garden and home near Oswestry. The house is long gone but along the path through its ruins the snowdrops continue to flourish and delight. #WildflowerHour

Just 4 flowers for #WildflowerHour after the snow and frost.

Misty gold sunset on the Shropshire border looking into Wales.

Oak tree in Melverley, Shropshire #thicktrunktuesday

Snow on the ground but a woodpecker is drumming!

New Year's Day brightness: guelder rose berries with old man's beard seed heads.

A new year's greeting from a wheezing greenfinch and 33 fieldfares on my morning walk. #birdsong

Yes!

Late again... Finding wildflowers in late December worries me but never fails to bring joy. The perfect daisy and primrose, the soggy, struggling hawkbit and that too-early catkin, each of them alive with promise. #WildflowerHour. Primrose, daisy, strawberry, buttercup, hazel catkin and hawkbit.

Starling murmuration at Whixall Moss, just after sunset.

Eleven hours late for #WildflowerHour but these brave flowers deserve their moment: viper's bugloss and common century (doomed never to open its petals), a celandine and a wonderfully fresh daisy.

A winter chorus of song thrush, robin and great tit singing with backing vocals from a tree full of starlings.

'It could steal your drink from across the room' says McAllister. Its Latin name even sounds like Prosecco.

The Government must remember that our most important infrastructure is our natural infrastructure protecting us from floods and fires.

Weakening environmental rules – as proposed in the Fingleton Review – is not the answer.

Watch here from 11:36: www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/live...

Song thrush singing in the November gloom.

Massive relief: I feared this day would never come.

Maybe it's a clone of the Glastonbury thorn

Bonkers! I found blackthorn in flower last week?

Just one solitary knapweed flower for #WildflowerHour but look, it's providing nectar for a beautiful green insect.

Thin ice on the floodwaters in the floodplain of the river Severn in Shropshire. Every few seconds you could hear the ice cracking. #winter

Ten feisty flowers brightening the wet November days in town and in the Oswestry hills: Devil's bit scabious, musk mallow, meadorw cranesbill, herb Robert, self-heal, hogweed, hawkbit, viper's bugloss, daisypnll9 and evening primrose. #WinterTen #WildflowerHour

‘We feel we’re fighting a losing battle’: the race to remove millions of plastic beads from Camber Sands A huge cleanup effort has seen volunteers working to remove beads by hand and machine. They can only wait and see the extent of damage to wildlife and dune habitat

#SouthernWater MUST pay for the clean-up of this disastrous plastic bead spill. www.theguardian.com/environment/....

Not so Golden Brown: DJ plays 24-hours of No 2s in Lake District sewage protest Radio host uses chart songs that didn’t quite make top spot to highlight issue of Windermere pollution

www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...