One of the prettiest hardy ferns, the lady fern is delicate and lacy, with ladder-like foliage. It makes a good garden fern, providing attractive cover for wildlife.

From spring, look out for the beautiful, speckled gold-and-black breeding plumage of the golden plover. It can be found in its upland moorland breeding grounds from May to September, moving to…

Beavers are the engineers of the animal world, creating wetlands where wildlife can thrive. After a 400-year absence, beavers are back in Britain!

When threatened, the Green tortoise beetle acts just like a tortoise, pulling its feet and antennae in and hunkering down, gripping the leaf it is on as tightly as possible. Look for it on White…

The green hairstreak is the UK's only green butterfly. Look out for the vibrant, metallic sheen of the undersides of its wings on grassland and moorland, and along woodland rides.

The Azure damselfly is a pale blue, small damselfly that is commonly found around most waterbodies from May to September. Try digging a wildlife pond in your garden to attract damselflies and…

The green sandpiper is a very rare breeding bird in the UK, and is mainly seen on migration in autumn. Look out for it feeding around marshes, flooded gravel pits and rivers. It even likes sewage…

Forming mats of straight, bright green stems, Common spike-rush does, indeed, look like lots of tightly clustered 'spikes' near the water's edge of our wetland habitats.

The common shieldbug was once restricted to Southern England, but has since been moving northwards and is now quite widespread. It can be found in all kinds of habitats from gardens to farms.

The shrill carder bee can be spotted flying quickly around flowers in unimproved pastures. The queens produce a loud, high-pitched buzz, hence the name. It is declining rapidly and is restricted…

A true wildlife 'hotel', Honeysuckle is a climbing plant that caters for all kinds of wildlife: it provides nectar for insects, prey for bats, nest sites for birds and food for small…