2023 County Report for Lanarkshire

Peter Wiggins & Michael Philip

In 2023 we have resumed previous levels of activity, with 11,614 records made across 193 monads and over 100 species recorded in 53 monads, nearly double the activity in 2022.

The Botanical Society of Scotland’s Urban Flora Project continued for another year, and we surveyed three towns in the vice-county making a total of 16 towns or urban areas surveyed.

As well as continuing to record in the SWT Falls of Clyde Reserve we worked with the South Lanarkshire Ranger Service to record in 3 LNRs which was combined with informal training for volunteers. This partnership will expand in 2024.

At the Falls of Clyde Reserve, we also hosted a very successful BSBI workshop “Ferns for Complete and Utter Beginners” which attracted 18 delegates from as far afield as Aberdeen and Newcastle.

We have started working towards a rare plant register for Lanarkshire and, looking forward to the centenary of the publication of J.R. Lee’s ‘Flora of Clyde Area’ (1933), we are beginning to assess how the flora has changed.

Malcolm Macneill has carried on his sterling urban botany work, noting Apera spica-venti (Loose Silky-bent) in two sites and then in November Oxybasis glauca (Oak-leaved Goosefoot) in a new housing development. Both were confirmed by the referees.

Lanarkshire is a big vice-county: why not pay us a visit sometime and help us tackle some of our many unrecorded areas?