The British flora comprises over 1100 native species, plus 600 common introduced species (and another 3000 rare introductions, that beginners don’t need to worry about). It is hence a rather daunting task for any beginner, to go from >1700 species down to one! However, you can greatly simplify the task by determining which family a plant belongs to, because if you know the family you can check just a few pages of your ID book, instead of trawling through all of them!
The method described here has been designed to be used by people with no prior experience of identifying plants, and its goal is to show which families your mystery plant might belong to. It has been tested and revised over ten years of classes with total beginners. In using it, you will also train yourself to recognise common plant families, which is the first step to becoming an expert!
No prior knowledge is needed, but you will need at least one picture-based plant Identification guide. It works best with one (or more) of the following three:
Concise British Flora by W. Keble Martin
(has the best pictures, but minimal text, and some species not illustrated; great for total beginners, and can often be got cheap second-hand)
Collins Flower Guide by D. Streeter et al.
(decent pictures and text, good for separating very similar species)
The Wild Flower Key by F. Rose
(probably the best text, again good for separating similar species, but pictures not as good as the other two)
To use this method, download the two sheets illustrated, using the PDF file immediately below this text. If you can, print them as one double-sided A4 sheet, and laminate or protect it in a plastic sheath, so you can take it into the field! I provide detailed instructions below, but with only a little practice you’ll be fine without these, and able to use just the two sheets.
