2023 County Report for Middlesex
Dr Mark A. Spencer
2023 has been very much a ‘desk-top’ year! The majority of my BSBI and London Natural History Society (as the vascular plant recorder for the LNHS – covering the Greater London Authority (GLA) area and nearby parts of adjoining administrative counties) time has been devoted to producing vascular plant Red and Axiophyte lists for Greater London and Middlesex. The Red-list will form the basis for a Rare Plant Register that will, initially, cover a planned revision of the GLA Priority Species list. The draft results of the Red-list are disturbing, of 964 assessed taxa (native & archaeophyte) 169 species are regionally extinct, this is likely to be a conservative estimate as there are many other species that have not been confirmed for a long time. A further 17 species such as Cornflower (Centaurea cyanus) have extant neophyte and ephemeral populations but are classed as regionally extinct in the wild. Another 156 species that have been assessed (either GB or England) nationally as Near Threatened, Vulnerable, Endangered or Critically Endangered are, usually, under greater risker of extinction within the GLA area or Middlesex. Finally, a large proportion of the species listed as Least Concern at a national level (either GB or England) are facing some level of extinction risk within the region. The above work, and the associated work on an axiophyte list could not have been done without the assistance from our local records centre, Greenspace Information for Greater London (GiGL), Paul Losse (Salix Ecology) and Julija Fediajevaite. We are planning a consultation exercise before the final documents are made available online via the BSBI, LNHS, GiGL and the GLA.
I led four joint BSBI/LNHS field trips in 2023: Victoria Park & Hackney Wick (20th May 2023); Rammey Marsh (17th June 2023); Monken Hadley Common (22nd July 2023) and Syon Park (19th August 2023). These walks provided some interesting records as well as helped forge greater connection between the LNHS and BSBI. After completing the consultation on the Red and Axiophyte lists, I will be compiling and submitting data to the BSBI and the LNHS (pending ratification of data sharing agreements between these orgs and our local records centre, GiGL).