Looking like a short Dandelion, but with a much rounder middle, Colt's-foot is a 'weed' of waste ground and field edges that brightens up early spring with its sunshine-yellow…

Forming mats of straight, bright green stems, Common spike-rush does, indeed, look like lots of tightly clustered 'spikes' near the water's edge of our wetland habitats.

The wasp spider is a great mimic - looking just like a common wasp keeps it safe from predators, even though it is not dangerous itself. It can be found in southern England, but is spreading north…

Famed for its tapping in the middle of the night, supposedly heralding tragedy, the Deathwatch beetle is a serious wood-boring pest. In houses, their tunnelling can cause major damage.

Look for the pinky-white flowers of the dog-rose in summer, and its bright red rosehips in autumn. It is a scrambling shrub of hedgerows, woodlands and grasslands.

A fluffy-looking grass of rough grassland, roadside verges and disturbed ground, False oat-grass is very familiar and often overlooked; in fact, it can help to stabilise dunes and shelter small…

The Marsh helleborine is a beautiful orchid of fens, wet grassland and dune slacks. Growing in profusion in places, look for reddish stems and white-and-pink flowers.

Looking a bit like a ragged version of a dandelion, mouse-ear hawkweed has lemon-yellow flower heads that are tinged with red at their outer edges. It likes grassy places with short turf and…

Sea-buckthorn is a spiny, thicket-forming shrub of sand dunes. It's native to the east coast of England but considered an invasive species elsewhere. It is most obvious in autumn when it is…

The water vole is under serious threat from habitat loss and predation by the American mink. Found along our waterways, it is similar-looking to the brown rat, but with a blunt nose, small ears…

The fearsome-looking hornet may not be a well-loved insect, but it is actually much less aggressive than the common wasp. It is also an important pollinator and a predator of species that feed on…