Meadows and more: a botanical journal of five days on the Uists, Benbecula and Eriskay

In the first week of July 2018, the Floodplain Meadows Partnership (FMP) held its annual steering group meeting with field excursions on the Outer Hebrides. The aim of the field part of our meeting was to familiarise ourselves with wet meadows (including those on machair) of the Uists and Benbecula, and compare their composition and ecology with related habitats further south in the UK. However, a chance for us to explore the other habitats of these islands was too good an opportunity to miss. Hence five of us arrived on the islands a few days before the main group and roamed more extensively, looking at a wide range of habitats in addition to meadows. The lead author’s role in this botanical journal was to note incidental observations made in addition to the formal study of the meadows. Hilary Wallace directed the quadrat recording in wet meadows, and the overall programme of work was coordinated by David Gowing and Emma Rothero of the Open University. Even during the FMP field excursions, we could not ignore other habitats entirely and Stewart Clarke (National Trust Freshwaters and Estuaries Specialist) paid special attention to the aquatic flora