While Covid-19 continues to impact severely on our lives and sadly continues to threaten and end lives, there may be safer days ahead and the safety of staff, members and others remains our top priority.

Now that legal regulations are set to be lifted in England and other countries may well follow soon, there is a shift towards giving advice and the onus being upon individual responsibility to reduce transmission of the virus. Since the situation may well be fluid for some time to come, our existing guidance remains in place as follows.

Field meetings have resumed, but remain subject to Government guidance specific to England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. In addition we recommend continuing with social distancing at all events and wearing face-masks when indoors. We hope to be able to resume indoor events in the coming months. You must check the latest details of any advertised meeting online or by contacting the meeting leader. Do not assume that a meeting can go ahead without checking. Arrangements for meetings outdoors and indoors may vary; indoor meetings may have to be replaced by electronic meetings. Guidance documents for both participants and for leaders of field meetings have been revised to take account of ongoing Covid-19 prevention measures, and all guidance must be followed at all times. In the meantime, if you choose to go out you must follow all current Government guidance for the locality, including social distancing and other Covid-19 prevention measures, as well as more general safe practices if fieldwork is permitted. BSBI Trustees continue to closely monitor the situation and reserve the right to change advice at short notice if necessary. If you have any questions, please feel free to get in touch with our Hon Gen Sec Steve Gater.

BSBI depends on a dedicated network of volunteer County Recorders who co-ordinate botanical survey work and organise local events.  To find out more about botanical activity in your area and to access local resources, please go to the individual county web pages. County Recorders are always glad to hear about botanical finds in their county, or you can use our record-a-plant form or email our enquiry desk.

More info on our England page: or contact our England Officer Dr Pete Stroh: pete.stroh@bsbi.org

More info on our Wales page;

More info on our Scotland page; or contact our Scottish Officer Jim McIntosh: jim.mcintosh@bsbi.org

More info on our Ireland page; or contact our Ireland Officer Paul Green paul.green@bsbi.org

Many counties have local groups with their own social media pages and blogs where they share photographs, discuss plant IDs, plan events and chat about interesting plants found in the county. You can also access many botanical/wildlife blogs by BSBI members via our News & Views page.

BSBI members can find full postal/ email addresses for all County Recorders in the BSBI Yearbook, which is sent to you when you join and is also available on our members-only pages. If you wish to contact all County Recorders with a request for data, please email our Head of Science to discuss.

If you are new to BSBI - for example, if you've come to us via the National Plant Monitoring Scheme, or #wildflowerhour or the New Year Plant Hunt - please do mention that when you get in touch with us.