FOREWORD
This message was sent to the South Lancashire Flora Committee from Roy Lancaster on 26 September 2025 after his first perusal of this new Flora of South Lancashire:
“I wish you all well on this important project and congratulate all those involved in helping to make the wealth of information regarding the flora of this region available to today’s and tomorrow’s enthusiasts.”
Roy Lancaster, plantsman, botanical explorer, broadcaster and author, was born in Bolton, Lancashire in 1937. His love of horticulture began with an intense interest in wildflowers and the native plants in and around his local patch. As a boy he wrote The Flora of Raveden (unpublished manuscript). Raveden Clough is a small wooded valley in north Bolton. Roy also contributed records to Travis’s Flora of South Lancashire (1964) edited by J.P Savidge, V.H. Heywood & V. Gordon.
The accompanying image was  taken from a poster used at Bolton Library in 2017 promoting a talk by Roy Lancaster about his new book.