Blackberries are one of the best-known fruits in the rose family. They’re often collected in the wild from hedgerows and woodlands.  September and October are usually the peak months for blackberry forays, but this year blackberries [with the exceptional warmth of the Spring and summer months], they have been ripening early.  Some ripe fruits were spotted back in June!  The fruits start off green, but as they mature they become red and finally black from stem to tip. The bramble has a perennial root system with biennial stems. In the first year, the stems (sometimes called canes) grow vegetatively, but in their second year they produce flowers and fruit.   Then they die back but the dried stems together with their prickles / thorns can persists for some time.  It is a good idea to wear some protective gloves when rummaging for these fruits. The leaves of the bramble are compound, with 3 - 5 - 7 leaflets which have serrated edges.  Its flowers are white to a subtle shade of pink.  They have 5 petals and first appear in early Spring.  They are attractive to pollinators such as bumblebees. Blackberries are a nutritious fruit, rich in Vitamin C but also contain other nutrients, e.g. Vitamin K and manganese.  A cup full of blackberries can provide 7 grammes of dietary fibre.   The colourings of the fruits (anthocyanins and flavonoids) are a source of antioxidants. Blackberries are a food source for wildlife food, many birds, foxes, and many small mammals (for example the dormouse) feed on the berries.  However, this earlier appearance of autumnal fruits may cause problems.  For example, some birds feed upon insects in the Spring and summer months but by autumn they move over to seeds and fruits, like blackberries. But what if the fruits have come and gone, and there are just the shrivelled remains of once juicy fruits.  There could be a 'food gap', this would be especially series for animals trying to prepare for the relatively barren days of winter.  Deer may feed on bramble leaves. If large amounts of bramble are allowed to grow in a woodland, it can affect the microclimate of the ground  layers.  This influences the growth and development of other plants. Whilst brambles can offer protection from browsing by deer and / or rabbits of young tree saplings, they can also suppress the development of light loving species.  A thicket of brambles can also offer a home to some birds, like the nightingale. Further reading - see here

To many people, the dandelion is a pernicious weed.   First one makes its way into your garden, but then due to its reproductive capacity - there are dozens.  Each flower stalk may produce up to 200 seeds with their characteristic parachute for dispersal.  A plant may produce 10 or so flower stalks, so that it is a lot of seeds from a single plant.  Once the seeds  disperse and germinate, they produce a significant tap root which grows down into the soil seeking water and minerals.  The seedlings can survive in inhospitable places, like the cracks between street paving stones or on your drive. As the seeds are wind blown, they may travel considerable distances with the aid of their ‘parachutes'.  However, changes in agriculture, increasing use of herbicides etc have meant that countryside populations of dandelions have diminished.  This has affected the insects that feed upon the dandelions' nectar and pollen.  As the number of these insects falls, it affects the seed production of other plants that these insects visit. Interestingly, urban dandelions seem to benefit from the heat island effect in cities.  A city may be some 2oC warmer than its surrounding countryside, more so in the summer.   Dandelions seem to thrive in the heat, growing more rapidly than their 'rural cousins'.  Urban warmth also means that the plants can begin to flower soon after a milder and shorter winter, whereas other plants struggle to adapt to changing environmental signals.   The urban  dandelions provide a 'feast' for insects in early Spring when resources are limited.  Urban meadows can provide 90% of the nectar for pollinators, and 80% of the pollen. These provide sugars and proteins / amino acids for some 200 species of pollinators [ solitary bees, mining bees, bumble bees, hover flies and pollen beetles].  The gifts of the dandelions are helping many struggling insect populations. Interesting fact : Dandelions often reproduce by a sort of sub-sexual system (termed apomixis) that has resulted in some 200+ microspecies in the U.K.  These have been studied by Professor John Richards for some 40 years.  The species name Taraxacum officinale has a gg. (for aggregate) added to it - in recognition of all the variations of the plant that can be found.  Thanks to Angus for images. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taraxacum officinale  

A recent court case centred around the use of the death cap mushroom to poison people at a dinner party.  The use of this fungus to kill people is not as unusual as you might expect. It may have been involved in the death of the Roman emperor Claudius, and that of Pope Clement VII in 1534.  The death cap was also implicated in the death of the composer Johann Schobert.  Having collected wild mushrooms in Pré-Saint-Gervais, he was told that they were not edible, indeed poisonous.  Nevertheless, he used them to make mushroom soup. He and his wife, and one of his children died after consuming the soup. [caption id="attachment_33585" align="aligncenter" width="650"] A young Death Cap showing the somewhat hairy stem[/caption] The death cap looks inoffensive, with a pale yellow cap and white gills and can be mistaken for edible species if fungi.  It thought to be responsible for the vast  majority of fungal related deaths.  The active compound is a toxin called alpha-amanitin.  It is absorbed through the small intestine and as it circulates in the blood stream, it passes to the liver and then to the gall bladder. The toxin then enters the intestine again when the bile is released when the person next eats.  This cycle may repeat several times, with the toxin inflicting more and more damage. [caption id="attachment_33580" align="aligncenter" width="650"] Death Cap (Amanita phalloides)[/caption] Why the death cap makes this toxin is not clear.  It may deter insects and other invertebrates from eating the mushroom, or may help it establish mycorrhizal relationships by ‘interfering' with rival fungi.  Interestingly, the death cap was once assumed to be native to Europe, but it is now to be found America and other parts of the world.  It is thought to have travelled on the mycorrhizae of imported trees For further details of the toxin(s) produced by the death cap, and its reproduction - see the New Scientist 6th September 2025. Photos by Jasper, see his blogs on fungi month by month.  

This morning,  the Today programme (Radio 4) featured an interview with Kevin Martin ( Head of Tree Collections at Kew) and Chris Packham (environmental compaigner).  They were explaining the ongoing effects of this summer’s hot and dry weather.  Mr Martin said that the trees at Kew were “ tired, they have had a stressful summer”.  The result is that many trees are entering their dormant stage, moving materials from aerial regions to the roots - much earlier than usual.  The colour changes in leaves and leaf drop do not usually occur until well into October but this year such changes are already  proceeding apace.  Kew has been able to put some mitigations in place, for example, the watering of young trees which have yet to establish extensive roots systems. This is not true for trees across the UK, where young saplings in particular may have been affected by the dry weather and successive heat waves, [plus increased browsing by the extensive deer population]. Chris Packham spoke of “climate breakdown” and “environmental chaos”, noting that an oak tree near him was ‘festooned with acorns’, but they were only the size of peas.  Normally acorns would fall later in the year as food for wood pigeons,jays, squirrels and badgers.  Jays help ‘plant’ oak trees by distributing acorns.  He said that whilst local hawthorns were red with berries, which would normally be food for winter thrushes later in the year, the berries would now be dried up / shrivelled when the birds arrived to search for them.  Though lots of hedgerow fruit [e.g. sloes, rose hips, blackberries] is being produced, it is being produced at the wrong time.  He also commented on the scarcity of mole hills as moles are forced to burrow deeper in the soil in search of earthworms etc. As the seasons change, some plants and animals adapt. For example,  blackcaps from Northern Germany fly to the UK rather than Spain to overwinter.  During a relatively short period, their wing length has changed, actually shortened - a case of evolution in action.  However, many species are struggling.   The  wet summer of 2024 was particularly difficult for butterflies, as evidenced by the data collected by the Big Butterfly Count. Nature's timings are now ‘out of sync’, plants and animals are further impacted by extreme weather events, flooding, high winds and extreme temperatures. [caption id="attachment_24651" align="aligncenter" width="600"] Sloes on Blackthorn.[/caption] https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/about-us/news-and-media/media-centre/weather-and-climate-news/2025/double-record-breaker-spring-2025-is-warmest-and-sunniest-on-uk-record