Titterstone Clee Hill Boulder Slope - Day 1 Morning of British Lichen Society Field Meeting in Shropshire

The BLS Summer Field Meeting this year was based at Preston Montford Field Centre just north of Shrewsbury. 10-14 July 2023

Big thanks to Eric and Mary Steer (local organisers) to Graham Boswell (Field Meetings Secretary of the BLS), and to about three or four of the society who were more knowledgeable than most of the rest of us, for sharing their knowledge. Indeed we all helped each other.

Here is a picture of us assembling on Day 1 (11 July). The weather could only get better...  (and it did, eventually)

The morning of Day 1 was to the boulder slope just below the top of Titterstone Clee Hill. At 533m 1749ft it is the third highest peak in Shropshire, and the only hill named in the Mappa Mundi (14th C Map of the World at Hereford Cathedral)

A sill of dolerite - olivine dolerite-  a very hard rock -  was intruded into the Carboniferous rocks here. The sill is very hard which is what protected this area, and left the hill standing -  especially during glaciations.

Eric and Mary took us to see some Sphaerophorus fragilis (This has dichotomous branches that are more or less equal in diameter, whereas S globosus  has dichotomous branches that are unequal in diameter)

Sphaerophorus fragilis

and 

and one thallus of Umbilicaria  cylindrica -
Yes, I know it would have looked better if it had not been dripping wet

By then the clouds were lifting a little .. we could see down the hill.

Paula had a useful app on her phone - My Lightening Tracker .. which showed that the heavy showers approaching would pass through shortly

We thought this brown lichen (top right) with squamules might be Hyphenomyces scalaris - even though that lichen normally grows on lignum. (Still waiting to hear if this is confirmed)

Graham (in blue near the centre)
found the only tree - a hawthorn.



I parked myself, wedged very comfortably between three boulders, whilst most of the others climbed higher in the boulder field.

A nice specimen of  - something I can recognise .. can you?

..Ophioparma ventosa

Unlike the following unknowns - Can anyone help?

This is a close up: (i.e.  the whole picture is only 0.5cm -0.8cm across)
Remember these lichens are saturated with water and swollen

??

The next five are all of the same species:  I was fascinated by the red apothecia.. The first three are 2.5 cm across, the last two are 0.5 cm across

Close-up - picture is 0.5cm across.

It was clearing up now and I could see to the horizon.

Eric came to retrieve me (and Mark and Fred) and we went back to join the others in the car park for lunch.

See the afternoon finds in my next post.