Plants

Pillwort is growing well on the wetland.  This is a little puzzling as land ferns are still dormant and will not be unfurling their fronds until late April.  The Pillwort growing indoors is just doing OK, producing some new curly fronds.  The sporocarps burst, producing the white spores.  About two weeks after bursting open there were tiny green fronds seen.  Amazing as spores from land ferns can take up to two years to develop into a small fern.

Interestingly the sporocarps that we opened and those that opened themselves away from the parent plant, have disappeared in the containers they are in. 

This Holly tree is growing in the gravel on the steps leading up from Risedale Beck.

The next question to be asked is how did the seed get there?  Dropped from the tree, carried by a bird or mouse, or the one the children love best, eaten by an animal who then does a dropping!

Beech tree seedlings were found growing on the moor last year.  The nearest Beech tree that produced a seed was at the beginning of the Sycamore Avenue.  Seeds hiddden away by Grey Squirrels and Jays?

Lichens and mosses are plants that will grow on almost anything, given the right conditions.  There is a small hole in the top of this post and the lichen is now filling it.

On the dry stone wall there are some mosses growing but then this plant was spotted and so far we have no idea what it is.  Patience required.