The first dandelion flower of the year has opened in The Waste and I am confident that it is the microspecies Taraxacum pseudohamatum. In Dandelions of Great Britain and Ireland Dudman & Richards (1997) say it is "a very robust weed and the commonest member of Section hamata in the British Isles, and indeed one of our commonest dandelions. It seems almost confined to these islands."
In the half hour or so I was there the flower attracted a solitary bee, a hoverfly, two or three pollen beetles and a thrips.
I cannot describe the pleasure this common 'weed' has given me from its first detection to today's appolonian climax, though there are many flowers and the seeds still to come.
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