Barnhill Conservation Group, registered charity - Fryent and Barnhill Gaderbrook update
The Narrow-leaved Bitter-cress (Cardamine impatiens) is a scarce plant in London and Hertfordshire; with apparently the only known site being at Fryent Country Park. It occurs there naturally; the last known London and Middlesex location being 'near Harrow' in 1901, which could actually be the same place as now, since the Wembley side of the Country Park was part of the parish of Harrow until 1894.
And then it was regarded as extinct in London and Middlesex.
Until re-discovered in the 1980s at Fryent Country Park.
Though related to the 'Bitter-cress' species that occur as weeds in gardens, it is much taller reaching about our waist height. Each set of leaflets is attached to the stem with a pair of characteristic arching stipules. Narrow-leaved Bitter-cress does prefer some slight ground disturbance where patches of soil are exposed, as for example on the hedgerow ditches of the - brook catchment. Elsewhere in Britain it occurs, for example on the exposed river banks of the River Medway and the River Seven, and on scree in the Pennines.
