Leicester Lit & Phil Natural History Section: More than Meets the Eye – the Wildlife of Grace Dieu

Steve Woodward will give a summary of a Loughborough Naturalists’ Club recording project, during which a compact area near Thringstone, Leicestershire, including the ruined priory of Grace Dieu was explored. Very long lists of flowering plants and fungi were accumulated. The coverage was consciously broadened to embrace the less popular groups of plants and animals: algae, wasps, millipedes, woodlice, thrips and soil mites.

Steve has been a section member since 1982. His first interest in Natural History was moths followed by an interest in landscape history, particularly its influence on wildlife. This led to his first two books, on Groby Parish and Swithland Wood. Natural history interests broadened to include mosses, liverworts, bees, wasps and lacewings. He has paid most attention to flowering plants (encouraged by section member, Edith Hesselgreaves), and has participated in the last three national atlas projects sponsored by the Botanical Society of Britain and Ireland (BSBI). In 2018 the BSBI appointed him as Joint Recorder for Leics & Rutland.