The Species Recovery Trust has been unable to find any field gentians in the New Forest for a second year, after hot, dry summers in 2025 and 2026. It warns the flower may be gone from southern England, though a wet summer next year could help it return.
In 2022, field gentian populations crashed at all known southern sites as UK temperatures reached 40°C for the first time on record, then recovered slightly the next year. The New Forest populations were thought able to survive because sites often held more than 5,000 plants each and livestock could carry seeds to sheltered areas.
Trust director Dominic Price described the loss of the once-abundant plant as a warning of how climate change could accelerate species loss, particularly in southern England, and said past evidence suggests the flower does not return once lost. Field gentians are still thriving at sites in northern England and Scotland. Forestry England's nature recovery manager said site management had not changed and attributed the population crashes to the hot, dry summers.
