Sprinkled with diminutive, short-living flowers in spring and parched dry by July, this is a habitat of heathlands, coastal grasslands and ancient parkland.

Typical of softly rolling pastoral landscapes, the short, aromatic turf of lowland calcareous grassland is flower-rich and humming with insects in the summer. Its long use by humans lends it an…

Gnarled veteran oaks are interspersed with groves of pale, elegant birches, while swathes of bracken and soft tussocks of wavy hair-grass cover ground from which autumn fungi sprout.…

These grasslands, occupying much of the UK's heavily-grazed upland landscape, are of greater cultural than wildlife interest, but remain a habitat to some scarce and declining species.

Heathlands form some of the wildest landscapes in the lowlands, where agriculture and development jostle for space, containing and limiting natural processes. Once considered as waste land of…

Water-logged and thick with reeds and robust tall-herbs or tussocky sedges, fens are evocative reminders of the extensive wet wildlands that once covered far more of the lowlands than they do…

Flower-rich grasslands, full of wildflowers such as orchids, snake's head fritillaries and bird's-foot trefoil support an abundance of insects, from bumblebees to butterflies.

Generally found as part of lowland farms or nature reserves, these small, flower-rich fields are at their best in midsummer when the plethora of flowers and insects is a delight. Tiny reminders of…

This is a strange, sparse habitat of grassland growing on old mining tracks and slag heaps, on river gravels and naturally exposed metal-rich soils in the mountains. Only the toughest metal-loving…