The Lake Vyrnwy reserve is around 10,100 hectares in size which makes the finding and recording of certain species rather difficult, needle in a haystack at times. Given the size, conducting comprehensive surveys of the whole site would be extremely time consuming and therefore surveys of specific habitats or areas are more realistic. The other method for recording species is Ad-hoc, which is basically coming across species while out and about, either specifically looking for certain taxa or randomly wandering.
Gethin trying to be artistic with my camera! (Photo by Gavin Chambers)
Last weekend Gethin and I (Assistant Wardens) went wandering around areas on the reserve we hadn’t explored much before and where some old records of interesting plant species occurred. The first location was a steep rocky heather clad slope which we had not explored before. A lesser clubmoss, not recorded on the reserve for several years, was the highlight along with banks of bilberry ladened in large juicy berries to keep us well fed!
Lesser clubmoss - less than 5cm tall (Photo by Gavin Chambers)
Our next aim was to go looking for some old records within the boggier areas of the reserve, with sedges being the point of interest. However the first plant to find was somewhere along a stream on a rock, which after a short wander we found it – mountain everlasting (Antennaria dioica). Only a couple of sites in the county of this species which has male and female flowers on separate plants (dioica meaning ‘separate’).
Mountain everlasting - no flower stalks seen (Photo by Gavin Chambers)
It was then time to start wading into almost wellington deep bogs to look for interesting sedges. Fortunately Gethin knows what he is looking at when it comes to sedges so it wasn’t long until we (I mean Gethin) found Carex limosa (bog sedge) with its distinct drooping seed heads and soon after several clumps of Carex paniculata (greater tussock sedge). The final sedge was Carex magellanica (tall bog sedge), which to me just looked like Carex limosa but Gethin reliably informed me that it was different… I’ll let you decide!
Carex magellanica (left) & Carex limosa (right) (Photos by Gavin Chambers)
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