Shifting ground has suited the colonies

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/apr/28/shifting-ground-has-suited-the-colonies

Version 0 of 1.

There is no better way to mark the land’s springtime rejuvenation than a sunny morning whiled away botanising in a floristically diverse meadow.

Merry’s Meadows – there are three fairly large fields – huddle together surrounded by a sea of bright yellow oilseed rape. The shallow corrugation of ridges and furrows indicate that a good proportion of the nature reserve was ploughed and cropped in mediaeval times.

This ancient disturbance created drier ridges and damper troughs, which as time passed allowed a wide range of plants to colonise the maturing grassland.

Somehow this patch was spared from the tsunami of fertilisers and ryegrass that swept our grasslands, which would have halted its maturation and impoverished its rich sward.

The ridge tops are dusted yellow with cowslips, while along the slopes the slightly damper soil favours the little purple spikes of droopy-flowered green-winged orchids (we counted 60 but doubtless there were many more).

The soggiest furrow is home to water avens; each tall, reddish stem arcs over and dangles two or three cherry-sized flowers like inverted wine-glasses. The pointed burgundy sepals sharply frame the creamy pink petals – it’s a design classic.

Another prototypical little plant, the adder’s-tongue fern, juts up from a mole hill, its single fleshy spear-leaf gently cradling its fertile spike. It’s a simple concept that still seems to work, although perplexingly its DNA recipe is exceptionally long; this fern has more chromosomes than any other organism.

Under a rotting ash log, a crinkled black beetle lies perfectly still. Playing dead is typical behaviour of the cramp-ball weevil. When freshly emerged, this chunky centimetre-long beetle is stylishly patterned with swirls of fawn scales. But while this individual has done well to survive the winter, its scales have rubbed away, leaving its sculptured black armour naked, apart from its still white clothed underside and posterior.

Rusty-black cramp balls, also known as King Alfred’s cakes, Daldinia concentrica, push through the bark of decaying ash, forming smooth hemispheres. The weevil’s soft white grubs thrive in the fungus’ unpromising, hard and dry, charcoal-like pabulum – I suspect safe in the knowledge that there are few other takers.

Follow Country diary on Twitter: @gdncountrydiary