An Invading Plant

Early in March, I took a walk to Old Hall Copse at Woking Palace to see if the daffodils were in flower. They were indeed flowering and very beautiful. But then my companion asked "What's all that red over there?" I turned to look and knew the answer straight away, the Palace Moat had been invaded by the Fairy Fern also called Water Fern, Azolla filiculoides. This water plant turns bright red under environmental stress, it doesn't much like the cold and we'd had snow not long before.

Azolla filiculoides, March 2018