Journal

Key findings Not everything in the record was definitely there. For example, pine trees have highly mobile pollen and can sometimes be overrepresented in the pollen record. Not everything absent from the pollen record was absent on the ground. For example, insect-pollinated plants are often absent, or under-represented in the pollen record. The most important data you can collect is direct observation. Evidence in the Dartmoor pollen record It was amazing how many little nuances I bumped into when I was reading the research papers. For example, one of the first reports from the 1960s identified pollen from pine trees...

The history of plants on Dartmoor is known from only a handful of studies which have been conducted on Dartmoor. Each of the studies has taken a sliver of dirt, and then examined it under a microscope to find the pollen from the plants that have grown here over time. Interestingly, these studies have shown that Dartmoor has been shaped by humans for as long as they've lived here. The pollen record shows variation of plants at different locations studied. This makes sense: the plants in my backyard are not the same as what grown on the open moor a...

Identification A small tree with thorns, white flowers, and pink anthers. Annual fruit, haws, are red berries. Flowers share a smelly chemical, trimethylamine, with that of decaying flesh. Botany Hawthorns will grow hundreds of years but, seeds take two winters to germinate. Leaves are edible. Lore Seen as both a protective and dangerous tree; the May tree was once a central part of the spring festivities. It symbolises rebirth and fertility; but also evokes death. Also known as pixie pears, due to the haws, the hawthorn tree is thought to be a spiritual tree of the faeries. How to make...

Identification Large tree with distinctive lobed leaves. Also, commonly appears in hedgerows. Acorns caps may have long (Q. robur) or short stem (Q. petraea). Botany The fruit, acorns, appear in mast years, occurring every 3-10 years. Oaks will grow for more than a thousand years, and support hundreds of other species; several are completely dependent on the oak. These include the purple hairstreak butterfly and some gall wasps. Part of the plant to use Galls, acorn caps, bark Lore The oak king is that of summer, sunlight and growth. The oak is a tree of rebirth and the renewed cycle...