The Guardian is highlighting today the threats to plants – and has used as it’s website picture one of Britain’s most threatened plants – Starfruit – a specialist of temporary ponds now restricted to a handful of sites as a result of habitat destruction, pollution and changes in land-use.
Starfruit used to be quite widespread on sandy acid soils, especially in the south-east.
The yellow square show where it used to live.
Now it’s hanging on by the skin of it’s teeth – in half a dozen ponds in the red squares – thanks particularly to the work of Plantlife.
But new pond creation also works for Starfruit: I even have a pond named after me which was created for the species on Stoke Common in Buckinghamshire!
You can see it here on Google Earth.
View Jeremy’s Pond, Stoke Common here.
