Task 7

Winter twigs

For this task I was asked to curate a mini-collection of winter twigs (digitally) and think of a theme to connect the ones that I chose.

I was provided with a key: "Winter Trees: a key to common trees and shrubs" (Bersweden, no date).

As well as the provided key, I have the related ID book by the Field Studies Council "Winter Trees: A photographic guide to common trees and shrubs" (Price and Bersweden, 2013) which proved useful in this exercise.

Initially I went to a local wooded area and started to ID some trees there without a particular theme in mind. However, I was struggling to connect them before I came across a section in the book labelled 'confusable species' - so I decided that would be a good theme!

This decision sent me on a bit of hunt to find the particular species I had in mind. To assist with this I ended up using nbnatlas.org to search the local area and went hunting!

So, below are the 6 twigs I have selected under the theme of 'confusable species'. The other specimens I recorded are detailed separately.

Confusable?

From Price and Berwesden (2013, pp. 10-11), I selected the easily confusable species of:

Beech and Hornbeam

Hawthorn and Blackthorn

The various species of Willow in this book are also described as being similar, so I have found specimens of Crack Willow and Grey Willow (possibly White Willow!)

ID: 009

Date: 17 Jan 2024

Locality: Bourton Park, Buckingham

Location (Lat/Long): 52.000, -0.982

Landscape/habitat: Community parkland, open space

Name: Beech, Fagus sylvatica

ID: 010

Date: 29 Jan 2024

Locality: Fritwell village

Location (Lat/Long): 51.957, -1.234

Landscape/habitat: Village green

Name: Hornbeam, Carpinus betulus

ID: 002

Date: 06 Jan 2024

Locality: Holloway Spinney, Buckingham

Location (Lat/Long): 52.006, -0.974

Landscape/habitat: Small broadleaf woodland, between housing and arable fields

Name: Hawthorn, Crataegus monogyna

ID: 011

Date: 29 Jan 2024

Locality: Ardley Quarry Wood

Location (Lat/Long): 51.942, -1.220

Landscape/habitat: Woodland edge, scrub

Name: Blackthorn, Prunus spinosa

ID: 008

Date: 17 Jan 2024

Locality: Bourton Park, Buckingham

Location (Lat/Long): 52.000, -0.976

Landscape/habitat: Community parkland, riverside

Name: Crack Willow, Salix fragilis

ID: 006

Date: 15 Jan 2024

Locality: Page Hill, Buckingham

Location (Lat/Long): 52.005, -0.972

Landscape/habitat: Path, near community woodland

Name: Grey Willow?, Salix cinerea

Reflection

This activity has shown me that a collection is not just about identification but also about locating the specimens! After deciding on a theme it then required some searching and use of other tools such as nbn atlas to find the desired species. It was also a little frustrating trying to identify the final Willow; it definitely requires consultation with other people to correctly identify and build a collection.

References

Price, D. and Bersweden, L. (2013) Winter trees: a photographic guide to common trees and shrubs. Telford: Field Studies Council.

These references were used for the Winter Twigs activity.

Bersweden, L. (no date) Winter trees: a key to common trees and shrubs. Salisbury: The Species Recovery Trust.

National Biodiversity Network Trust (NBN Trust) (2023) About the NBN Atlas. Available at: https://nbnatlas.org/about-nbn-atlas/ (Accessed: 05 March 2024).