The mysterious plateau

The top of the sallow log, put in place when this window box project was started, is a most unusual habitat.  There is no soil, of course, and the wood seems to decay very slowly, though various insects have bored into it or hatched out of it.

There are a couple of moss species and the black marks are, I think, some kind of fungus.  There are two clumps of rush and, to the right of the farther one, what I have now identified as a hazel seedling (how did it grow there – a hazel nut could hardly be buried in the wood: did it force its way up from near the base of the log?).  There are three more young plants in front of this, one of the weedier willow herbs I think, and a grass in front of the leading rush.  The white thing like a garlic clove is a petal blown from a nearby bird cherry.  Between the two rush clumps there is a strange, snake-like seedling that I cannot identify.  The cotyledons look curiously like bananas.

So, at least eight plants resident on the lost world of the Sallow Plateau.