2022 County Report for Leicestershire

Geoffrey Hall, Stephen Woodward and Russell Parry

We produced a Newsletter in May with details of records and publications on local botany in recent years to bring local botanists up to date.

SFW & GH have been filling in gaps in tetrad coverage, and RP has been surveying Leicester City by monad. To date, 24,938 records have been added to the BSBI’s DDb for 2022.

Surveys were done of the Belvoir Estate woodlands, Launde Abbey grounds, Wing Water Treatment Works (for Anglian Water), a potential solar panel site near Barrow on Soar and some LWS’s (both for Leicestershire County Council). SFW completed the VC55 churchyard survey (started in 2012). RP re-surveyed some Leicester streets to investigate changes caused by herbicide.

RP and Richard Mabbutt organised three recording/training meetings for local botanists. RP helped run a University of Leicester plant ID course and led some ID sessions for the Charnwood Forest Landscape Project and the LRWT. Several talks were given for local societies promoting botany.

We collaborated with a Leicester University project about woodland resilience. RP helped Friends of the Earth with an anti-herbicide campaign, and continued regular maintenance of, and investigations at the University of Leicester Herbarium. GH & SFW served on the LRWT’s Conservation Committee, and GH was appointed a trustee of NatureSpot.

A New Rare Plant Register for 398 locally rare and scare plants was completed and the full grid reference (restricted distribution) is available. A tetrad only version for general distribution is in preparation and will be published in January; an online version will be available later in the year.

Publications

  • Woodward, S. and Ikin, H. (2022) ‘More Than Meets the Eye. The Wildlife of Grace Dieu, Leicestershire’. Loughborough: Loughborough Naturalists’ Club.
  • Hall, G. (2022) In the Footsteps of Jack Badcock: ‘In the Countryside of South Leicestershire’ Revisited. Leicester Lit. and Phil. Soc. Newsletter 114: 8-17.
  • Hall, G. & Woodward, S. (2022) Leicestershire & Rutland (Vice-county 55). Rare Plant Register. 192 pp. Leicester: published privately.
  • Hall, G. (2022). How Should I Record and Where Should I Send My Records? English Botanical News 3: 100-104.

Lycopodium clavatum (Stag’s-horn Clubmoss)

One plant was found at Beacon Hill Country Park in March, 2021. This is the first record at this site since 1902: it last recorded in VC55 in 1973 and was believed to be locally extinct.

Samolus valerandi (Brookweed)

Two plants were found on the banks of the Grand Union Canal near Crane’s Lock in October 2022 following clearance of an overhanging tree. This is only its second extant site.

Sorghum halepense (Johnson-grass)

This alien grass was discovered at Newstead Avenue, Leicester in August 2022, and is a First County Record.