Flora of Ashdown Forest - Botanical Society of the British Isles

137Centaurium pu/chellum. Lesser centaury.Broadstone Warren (42.321, 1954 and Fairwarp area 1956, P. A. Barker (BRCI.Tetrads 43G and 43R (Hall 19801.A few plants on west side of Wych Cross Reservoir embankment (419.315),1995, TR & E. Goddard; abundant on ride in Funnell's Wood (442.2621, 1995, TR &3 PA; verge by Box car park (459.2871, 1993, OS et al.; Five Hundred Acre Wood(48.321, 1993, ER & RN.Scattered in the Weald and adjacent chalk, one of its strongholds in Britain. It islocally distributed in the New Forest and the Bedfordshire area, and very rare and4 5 scattered around the coast of England and Wales. Widespread in Europe, especiallynear the sea, and west and central Asia.*Blackstonia perfo/iata. Yellow~wort.Meadow near Wych Cross, J. Weaver (Wolley-Dod 19371. Tetrad 42U (Hall 19801. Presumably introduced inboth cases and not refound.Common on the chalk in Sussex, and occasional in the Weald sometimes introduced. Locally abundant onchalk soils in southern Britain. West central and southern Europe, south-west Asia and Morocco.Gentianella. Gentians.There are records for G. campestris, field gentian "On Ashdown Forest" and for G. amarella, autumn gentian "OnAshdown Forest, near Wood's Nursery" in Deakin (1871), which possibly refer to the same plant, and also thesame as the G. amarella record 'near Wood's Nursery, Maresfield, F. A. Malleson' in Wolley-Dod (1937). Of thetwo species G. campestris is more likely to have been present as it is not a strict calcicole, but neither arecurrently known and we have been unable to trace any specimens.Gentiana pneumonanthe. Marsh gentian, Calathian violet.On the Forest, about a mile north-east of Wood's Nursery, on a bank facing southeast,plentifully (Cooper 1835) [Wood's Nursery was between Fairwarp andMaresfield on Nursery Lane]. Ashdown Forest (Deakin 1871). In the Forest nearWood's Nursery, Maresfield, plentifully, W. C. Unwin; Ashdown Forest, Miss A. Wallis(Arnold 18871. Nutley Downs, 1889, T. Hilton (BMI. Found on the Forest (Firmin18901. Rest near Chelwood Gate, 1898, D'Alquin & C. E. Salmon (BM; BTNI.Ashdown Forest (Done 19141. Heathy ground east of Chelwood Gate, 1919, F. J.Hanbury (BM). Near Chuck Hatch, 1933, W. C. Barton (BMI. Between Nutley and4 5Horney Common, A. G. Gregor; between Nutley and FClirwarp, Miss Gatty; bog nearChelwood Gate, abundant, C. C. Plowden; Wych Cross; damp heath near Pippingford Park, 1930, A. E. Ellis(BTN); valley between Pippingford and Nutley, E. C. Wall ace; near Chuck Hatch, E. C. Wallace (Wolley-Dod 1937).Many references to plants at Pippingford Park, on a slope near Five Hundred Acre Wood, Duddleswell, two sitesprobably near Chelwood, and one site at Twyford, G. Dent (Dent 1928-1953). Masses in valley bog east of NewLodge Farm below Gills Lap, late 1940s, C. D. Pigott. Near Nutley, 1957, R. A. Boniface (BRCI. Tetrads 42N,42P, 42Z and 43F in Hall (19801, with nine extra tetrad records in Briggs (1990).We have found Gentians in 13 squares on the Forest, with the main populations in the Misbourne valley andthe Millbrook grazing enclosure. The populations vary in size from single flowering spikes to over 100 plants, butsome populations in the 1950s had thousands of plants, FR. From casual observation they seem to be in declineas there is no room for new seedlings amongst the dense Molinia that surrounds them. Studies in the Netherlandshave shown two types of population: on wet, inundated heaths populations have high recruitment of seedlingsresulting in a dynamic population with plants of different ages; whilst in unfertilised grasslands dominated byMolinia there is very little recruitment and the static, even-aged populations slowly decline. Our populations onAshdown Forest seem to be of the latter type. In the past grazing and trampling by the commoners' cattle andhorses would have provided appropriate conditions for recruitment of new plants, and it may be significant thatthe largest remaining populations on the Forest are in the areas in which grazing continued the longest.Gentians apparently regenerate well after mowing or grazing early in the year, but they are adversely affectedby grazing at the wrong time, or lack of grazing. When grazing was re-introduced on 100 acres near Millbrook in1989, the cattle grazed them unselectively so an exclosure was erected to protect them. Where grazing has beentotally excluded the plants are surrounded by dense Molinia as elsewhere on the Forest, but they do flower andsurvive the grazing, albeit in lower numbers.Marsh gentian is rare but locally frequent where conditions are right in Britain, but it is decreasing in manylocalities. It is a long-lived perennial with a mean life expectancy of about twenty years. The seed-bank is shortlived(no more than five years) so if seed production is wiped out one year by picking, mowing or grazing at thecrucial time recruitment suffers (Chap man 1994).A lowland species in the British Isles, confined to damp, acidic heathland in two main parts in England andWales. In the south it extends from Dorset to Kent and Surrey, but is now probably extinct in West Sussex. Inthe north it occurs in North Wales, northern England and East Anglia. [t has been recorded in 50 1 O-km squares in