Plant alert is a new citizen science project aimed directly at gardeners to help spot potentially invasive species.  It was launched on 1 June by the Botanical Society of Britain and Ireland (BSBI), in conjunction with Coventry University Department of Agroecology, Water and Resilience.

Invasive non-native plants can cause major problems for native biodiversity, ecosystems, infrastructure, as well as to our urban environments and human health. The most notorious of these in the UK is Japanese Knotweed.

Sadly, most invasive plants were introduced as ornamental garden plants but then escaped into the wider environment.  Gardeners therefore have a big part to play and are being asked to report plants that they notice spread wildly and difficult to control.

So why not do your part?  See their Plant_Alert_Flyer for more information or go directly to the Plant Alert Survey.  Reporting your findings is easy and can be done anonymously.

You can also take a look at their live survey results thus far when you visit the Results page.  This is a list of invasive plants that have been reported by other citizen science respondents from around the country.  Results are updated every few minutes.

Unfortunately their results page does not include photographs of the plants, but if you’re really determined you can always cut & paste the plant names to search image results online.