Also known as the flat topshell, these are one of the most common and colourful sea snails you are likely to see when out on a rockpool safari!

This stocky wader is mostly a winter visitor to the UK, where it can be found on rocky, seaweed-covered coasts, often with groups of turnstones.

This is probably the most widespread and commonest of the marsh orchids.

A tall plant, purple-loosestrife can form dense stands of bright purple flower spikes in wet habitats like reedbeds, fens and marshes.

The early gentian is a rare plant that is only found in the UK. It likes sunny, lowland chalk grasslands, its purple, trumpet-shaped flowers blooming in May and June.