Involves work on the conservation of Scottish flowering plants and ferns. Many species are vulnerable or endangered due to climate change or changing land use and are in cultivation at the RBGE. Read more http;//rbg-web2.rbge.org.uk/scotplant/Target%208/Target%208a.html
Some of the species are described here.
Norwegian mugwort (Artemisia norvegica) grows on three tundra-like mountain tops in
Wester Ross and Sutherland where there is little other vegetation. The plants grow on stony, windswept ridges, anchored by thick roots.
Permanent plots have been discreetly defined at the known locations to monitor the survival of this plant. Climate change modeling has suggested this species could be lost by the end of the century.
Read more on the dedicated project website.
Purple ramping-fumitory
(Fumaria purpurea) is a nationally scarce arable species that is only found in Britain.
Because Fumitories are difficult to tell apart their distribution is not fully recorded, and careful examination might reveal that this plant is less rare than it appears to be. Seven species of Fumitory are found in
Scotland; workshops have been held to provide the opportunity to look at the species before going out to study them in the field. Read more on the dedicated project website.

Marsh clubmoss (Lycopodiella inundata) is also nationally scarce. As it grows on disturbed water margins many sites have been lost as ponds have been drained, especially in the south-east of Scotland. Populations on fluctuating loch margins in the north-west are more successful and sustain viable populations. The British Pteridological Society helps to monitor an unusual population on a flushed slope near Loch Lomond.
Read more on the dedicated project website http://rbg:web2.rbge.org.uk/scotplant/Lochs/Lycopodiella.html

Whorled Soloman’s-seal (Polygonatum verticillatum) is restricted to ten locations on steep riversides in the southern Highlands of Scotland where it often does not flower or set seed. A population that was being eroded from a river bank was rescued, propagated at the
RBGE and reintroduced in the same area. Read more on the dedication project website http://rbg:web2.rbge.org.uk/scotplant/Deciduous%20 W html

Woolly willow (Salix lanata) is now restricted to only fourteen alpine sites in Scotland. Nine of these sites now have very few plants, are vulnerable to grazing and are in danger of losing these last remnants. In some populations there are insufficient numbers of male and female plants to ensure pollination and seed development. Some augmentation and re-introductions have been carried out to enable populations to increase. A single female bush was the focus of one augmentation with the addition of 28 plants of both sexes. Genetic information has been gathered in a project on sub-arctic willows with collaboration between the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh, the
Macaulay Institute, the Scottish Agriculture College, the Scottish Crop Research Institute the
University of Aberdeen and the University of Edinburgh. As part of the Species Action
Framework seed has been collected from the Woolly willow and associated willow species to replant larger areas and restore this habitat.

Oblong woodsia (Woodsia ilvensis)
is currently found in only seven sub-alpine sites across Britain where some of the populations have a recorded decline to only one or two plants, and do not appear to be regenerating. In some historically known locations this fern has completely disappeared but a Conservation Collection made up of living plants grown from spores collected from all the British sites is maintained in Edinburgh. There have been re-introductions at two sites in the north of England and two sites in the Scottish
Borders. By having plants in cultivation it has been possible to carry out experimental work on the fitness of gametophytes and sporophytes and there are suggestions of inbreeding in the smallest populations. The Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh is the Lead Partner. Read more on the dedicated project website.
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