Beautiful afternoon in Hampshire, walking round the footpaths - the golden yellow of the sunflowers and the clouded yellow butterflies - a lovely mellow afternoon - and all the nicer now it’s not quite so hot (25C today)

Common blue butterflies on our wildflower meadow this morning, we were really dead heading knapweed to help with improving the biodiversity, but got side tracked by the butterflies! So many today #wilderHook #butterflies

For #WildFlowerHour #stillFlowering - the first of this years marsh gentian (Gentiana pneumonanthe) on a heath in North East Hampshire, they seem early this year, and are often associated with end of summer (although as schools haven’t finished yet, summer is not really ending!)

yesterday was the #wilderHook bioblitz - it was a bit hot for being in a field, and today I've started to collate the results - for a second year running our highlights were the butterflies - we saw several hairstreak butterflies, including this white-letter hairstreak #butterflies

For #Wildowerhour - first two from a fen in NE Hampshire, a marsh helleborine and marsh fragrant orchid, then 5 or 6 hours up the m6 and broad leafed and a northern marsh orchid from Lancashire #roadtrip #orchids

For #wildflowerhour the cute frilly orchid that is Epipactis palustris, the marsh helleborine seen locally during the week in Hampshire

For #wildflowerhour #polinatorpals meadow brown butterfly on knapweed on our local wild flower meadow

This week a bit late for #wildflowerhour, a visit to Greywell moors, so many marsh orchids, bee orchids, common twayblades, also but not pictured pyramidal, CSO & HSO - so many orchids!

This week for #wildflowerhour, the challenge is #lawnflowers, this is my wild area out the front of our house, a sea of yellow flowers #nomowmay #bloominjune

#wildflowerhour #orchids - all growing in my village, the lovely colours of EMO Dactylorhiza incarnata, Dactylorhiza x grandis, SMO Dactylorhiza praetermissa, and a bee orchid Ophrys apifera (which is special because it’s growing on a verge in a housing estate!)

Missed this for #wildflowerhour, but a large colony of ivy broomrape orbanche hederae just starting to flower on a verge near me (you can see the end of last years plants in the background)

For #wildflowerhour #tinyplants Heath milkwort Polygala serpyllifolia, a tiny flower on the local (acidic) heath in NE Hampshire

For #wildflowerhour #carrotsandpeas common vetch Vicia sativa in the pea family

For #wildflowerhour southern adders tongue - Ophioglossum vulgatum, love the shape of this plant! An indicator of ancient grasslands

For #wildflowerhour on the Heath today lousewort and milkwort (two wort plants, wort or wyrt being old English for root, herb or plant!). Fun fact: Lousewort is hemi-parasitic in the Orobanchacae family

One more for #wildflowerhour, I’ve been in Scotland, and came home to Hampshire earlier this week, the change in flowers in 10 days was vast, native bluebells (Hyacinthoides non-scripta) flowering in the local woods #bluebells

For #wildflowerhour#cabbagefamily a cuckoo flower, ladies smock or Cardamine pratensis which is loved by orange tip butterflies, they‘re plentiful this year round our way

For #wildflowerhour, finally, local orchids are in flower - early purple orchids in NE Hampshire #orchids #epo

For #wildFlowerHour, a cowslip for #cowslipchallenge (and because it’s Easter there’s also a bit of Good Friday grass, if you look close enough).

In the church graveyard, for Good Friday, Luzula campestris, commonly known as Good Friday grass (its rush family). Always seems to be flowering for Good Friday! #wildflowerhour #wilderchurches

So many flowers this week, hard to chose a couple of highlights from a wet walk in an ancient woodland - bluebells, greater stitchwort, wood anemone and violet (prob common dog Violet) #wildflowerhour

For #Wildflowerhour #treeflowers willow (pussy willow salix caprea) aren’t they fabulous catkins

For #wildfliwerhour #wilderchurches, you have to love an old churchyard, often undisturbed grasslands with so many wild flowers, a carpet of celandine

Wood anemone, just starting to flower in NE Hampshire #wildflowerhour - they spread very slowly perhaps 6 ft in a 100years - so a marker of ancient woodland

For #wildflowerhour #spring - bluebells, sweet violet, early dog violet and cowslips

For #wildflowerhour, the white frothy hedges that is blackthorn flowering, interestingly I don’t remember seeing sloes and flowers at the same time before 🤷‍♀️

For #WildFlowerHour Loddon Lily (Leucojum aestivum) from NE Hampshire in a small copse which is a SINC (ancient woodland) - we’re not too far from the Loddon, so maybe native.

Definitely blackthorn is flowering our way, complete with a few left over sloes!

A day late for #wildflowerhour, but worth waiting for a dry day, and so nice to catch a little sunshine! Today on my walk my first cowslips of the year (well first couple), a welcome shot of yellow #wildflowerhour #signofspring

For #WildFlowerHour, snowdrops in a local woodland SINC and a stinky hellebore with a ladybird (hiding from all the rain this week?)