Feeling Blue

Just spent the last few days down in Cambridgeshire (VC29) monitoring the progress of recently created calcareous grassland near West Wratting. The grasslands were putting on a good show and alive with bumblebees and butterflies. This unusual blue-flowered form of Common Mallow (Malva sylvestris) caught the eye, I thought it was Chicory (Cichorium intybus) until I got up close. It is very similar to some cultivated forms, but there are no grounds to suspect anything other than a natural occurrence via a chance mutation.