vetchling

The signs tell you that the reserve, for example, contains meadow buttercup, knapweed and vetchling, with speckled wood, skipper, marbled white and gatekeeper butterflies all keen.

And there was joy in his voice for those buttercups growing in profusion along with ox-eye daisies, cowslips, meadow vetchling and ragged robins on the reclaimed Pickerings Meadow, rising from the salt marshes on the Widnes side of the Mersey.

Upland meadow flowers include wood crane's-bill, lady's mantle, pignut, globe flower, red clover, meadow vetchling, great burnet, ragged robin, melancholy thistle, meadow buttercup, selfheal, ribwort plantain, common knapweed, rough hawkbit, meadow saxifrage, devil's-bit scabious, sneezewort and common sorrel.

No longer uniform green, it is a patchwork quilt of colours; the yellows of meadow vetchling mix with pink patches of spotted orchids and the creamy-white effervescence of marsh bedstraw.

Furthermore, the pattern CvCCCCvCC is, somewhat surprisingly, the twelfth most productive of all the 9-letter C patterns, forming the basis of words which include: BANDSTAND, CATCHMENT, DITCHLESS, FETCHLING, GOLDCREST, HUNCHBACK, JOHNSWORT, KICKSHAWS, LOCKSMITH, MALTSTERS, NIGHTFALL, PATCHWORK, QINGCHENG (in China), RATCHMENT, SUBSCRIPT, TOWNSFOLK, VETCHLING, WATCHWORD, XINGZHONG (in China), ZOLLPFUND (w2).

Meanwhile, out in Netherton, on an area of grassy rubble near Dunnings Bridge Road, David Bryant found 680 bee orchids, two pyramidal orchids and a large concentration of grass vetchling, complete with crimson flowers and grass-like leaves.

Abundant wild flowers include marsh and spotted orchids, lousewort, yellow rattle, bird's-foot trefoil, meadow vetchling, tufted vetch, devil's-bit scabious, betony and knapweed, which attract hosts of bees and butterflies such as ringlets, meadow and hedge browns, small skippers and common blues.

All flowering plants, including cowslips, red clover, yarrow and yellow vetchling, will be collected over a one-year period and provide a snapshot of the changes over 150 years.