Coltsfoot

Coltsfoot, Tussilago farfara one of the earliest spring flowers should be in bloom from February but it was half way through March when I saw my first of the year. Although we might expect an early bloom in these days of climate change there is a theory that warmer autumns may delay flowering. Much more research is needed to establish a definite link.

Here they are on the thinly grassed edges of Wye Valley woodland rides. The daisy-like flowers (no surprise it's a member of the Asteraceae family) appear before the leaves, giving rise to one of its folk names: Son before father. There are some very descriptive local names: Sweep's Brushes and Yellow Stars in Somerset.

I saw tight purple-tinged buds in leaf litter before I saw these blooms on a sunnier edge. The ray florets are many and thin. The stigmas are very slender. The disc florets form the centre. Early bees and beetles visit it for nectar and pollen. There are photo-bombing beetles here. I should have looked closer!

The flowering stem carries a solitary bloom. This stem has felted white hairs and many purplish, scale-like bracts.

There are no leaves at this stage. 

The leaves give rise to the English name Coltsfoot as they resemble a colt's or foal's foot. I rather like the name Clatterclogs used in Cumbria! Well after the flowers are gone the leaves will grow large and tall on different stalks. The felted white hairs initially on both sides of the leaves give rise to the name farfara. They bear some similarity to the shape and texture of leaves of the White Poplar tree, whose undersides are white and hairy. Its ancient name was Farfarus. The dry felt on Coltsfoot leaves has been used as tinder.

Tussilago comes from the Latin 'tussis', a cough and 'ago' roughly speaking to drive away. Greek and Roman physicians in the first century CE extolled its virtues as a soothing substance, expectorant and tonic. Linnaeus said the Swedes smoked it to soothe the lungs. Known as Baccy Plant in Somerset the leaves are often used as a basis for herbal tobacco and as such it can still be bought as a tobacco or a tea leaf. Coltsfoot Rock is similarly available. As it counted as a cough sweet it was not on ration during the war and could be bought from chemists by children and adults wanting a sweet treat. Tushy-lucky, as this plant is known in Scotland, is a corruption of tussilago.

 

I am going to finish with a few lines of very free verse:

Coltsfoot wheels verge the woodland path,

grounded partners of Helios;

reaching up, 

reflecting his chariot's course, 

as he warms the land,

announcing the Spring.

                                              

I hope you enjoyed this short blog.

Acknowledgements

Mabey Flora Britannica

Harrap's Wild Flowers

Grigson The Englishman's Flora

Websites include

https://botanical.com/

https://wildflowerfinder.org.uk/

https://naturescalendar.woodlandtrust.org.uk/blog/2020/coltsfoot-a-little-ray-of-sunshine-in-the-spring/

Wood Anemone

Wood Anemone, Anenome nemorosa has been such a welcome sight over this past week and a flower that grows over almost all of the British Isles seems a good start to the blogs of 2021.

In each of the blogs this year I am hoping to use some literature. I start with John Clare (1793-1864) who  enjoyed these blooms as much as we do and wrote in a poem entitled Wood Anemone of "weeping flowers in thousands pearled in dew" and their "clipt-frilled leaves" on slender stalks. A modern botanist might say the stem has a whorl of three leaf-like bracts. Which description do you prefer?

There were not thousands in bloom on the wooded banks of the Wye near Monmouth this week, more like dozens, but perhaps the thrill is greater for the first few of one of the earliest spring flowers! The name anemone comes from the Greek god of wind, Anemos, who scattered the flowers across the land to herald his coming in the spring. Another Greek myth has these blooms rising from Aphrodite's tears as they fell in the woodlands she wandered after the death of Adonis. However romantic these myths seem the plant is poisonous to humans. Incidentally, I was intrigued about nemorosa too- Latin for wooded or shady if you are interested!

This native plant from the Ranunculaceae family spreads very slowly, no more than six feet or so in a hundred years, through its creeping rhizomes. It is thus an indicator of ancient woodland. It can have a sharp musty smell on warm days which may have given rise to one of its folk names in Somerset: Smell Foxes. Other names refer to the shape of the flower: Granny's Nightcap in Somerset, Wiltshire and Warwickshire; and perhaps the less innocent Moll o' the Woods in Dorset and Warwickshire and Lady's Petticoat in Wiltshire. The solitary blooms are often flushed pink, especially on the outside as here.

I recently found out that what appear to be six or seven petals are in fact sepals. The flower has no petals. The pitcher-shaped stigmas just about visible here are surrounded by a ring of stamens. The plant is pollinated by hoverflies.

Lockdown means I will not be able to visit any new habitats for a while so blogs could be rather sporadic. I will only cover plants that I missed last year. There were a few! There is little point in repeating last year's material when it is still available. 

I hope you have enjoyed this short blog and perhaps been reminded of something you had forgotten.

Thank you for reading. 

Resources used

Flora Britannica Richard Mabey

The Englishman's Flora Geoffrey Grigson

Harrap's Wildflowers

Stace 4

Web searches included: 

https://www.plantlife.org.uk

https://www.botanical.com

http://www.seasonalwildflowers.com 

Common Gromwell and Common Calamint

This will be the last blog for a while as I am largely seeing only what I have already focused upon. 

It seems appropriate that by chance it will cover two species that despite their names are not particularly common and in the case of Common Calamint declining. 

• Common Gromwell, Lithospermum officinale
• Common Calamint, Clinopodium ascendens

Common Gromwell

I found this by chance at the end of a walk in the Cannop area of the Forest of Dean. I only saw the one plant and knew I'd not seen it before, but luckily from the similarity of the one flower to a Forget-me-not and therefore the Boraginaceae family, identified it from Simon Harrap's Wild Flowers. Thanks to the #Wildflowerhour community on Twitter for confirming it. 

It grows in some southern parts of the UK but is less common elsewhere. It is native to Europe and Eastern Asia and has been introduced to other regions including North America.

 

The cream flower is so small it is a key ID feature. The plant is tall, hairy, with alternate, narrow and  spear-shaped leaves. The veins are conspicuous.

A few days later after heavy rain I went back hoping to find a colony and I did. Over 400 metres or so of the open woodland ride there are many plants. There were thousands of seeds which bodes well for the future here.

The 5 narrow sepal teeth clasp around the fruits. Sepals have longish hairs on the outside. The hard egg-shaped fruits change colour as they mature, the shiny white like porcelain being the last stage.

The rather mysterious name comes from the Old French gromil, modern French grémil. The gré suggested grey and the fruits themselves grains of mil or millet. Gromwell also came known as milium solis, 'millet of the sun'. It grows here on a largely cleared woodland hillside in full sun.

Its local name in the north of England, Stony-hard, reflects its herbal medicine use in the sixteenth and seventeenth century against stones. It may have been the lithospermon or 'stone-seed' of Dioscorides and indeed can be called European Stoneseed. It has been used widely, for example against gout, as a diuretic and as a contraceptive.

Common Calamint

I first found this hairy herb from the Lamiaceae family in the Forest of Dean Cannop area last year and returned hoping to find it again. I think it had increased at the top of the spoil heap, a dry area that suits it well. Again thanks to the #Wildflowerhour expert who agreed the ID.

The flowers are whitish-pink with small purple spots on the lower lip. The leaves, with shallow and blunt teeth, are short-stalked with curved veins and smell distinctly of mint. The upper lip of the corolla is flattish and has a notch at the top. The lower lip is short and three-lobed. There are four stamens, two unequal stigmas and one style.

The calyx has five teeth, the lower two are slightly longer and narrower. I hope that can be seen here along with the hairs.

It was a very windy day so I took a tiny piece for macro pics at home leaving plenty behind. It is a plant that is decreasing in its range. The reasons include lack of control in its grassland habitats and changes in road verge management. However, it is now better recorded particularly in East Anglia and Somerset. 

It is native to temperate areas of Europe and used as a culinary herb in Italy. In Madeira, where it is known locally as neveda, it is used as a mouth freshener and to alleviate headache and toothache. It was known to Culpepper who writes of its usefulness in easing brain afflictions, leprosy, convulsions, cramp and yellow jaundice.

Acknowledgements

Simon Harrap's Wildflowers

Stace 4

Rose The Wild Flower Key

Grigson The Englishman's Flora

www.researchgate.net/

www.brc.ac.uk/

www.wildflowerfinder.org.uk/

www.wildflowerweb.co.uk/

www.geograph.org.uk/

www.first-nature.com/

Scarlet Pimpernel, Sticky Groundsel and Black Nightshade

 These three were found near the railway station in Lydney, Gloucestershire and photographed over a couple of months to catch the seed heads.

• Scarlet Pimpernel, Lysimachia arvensis
• Sticky Groundsel, Senecio viscosus
• Black Nightshade, Solanum nigrum

Scarlet Pimpernel, Lysimachia arvensis

This native plant, usually an annual, from the Primulaceae family has a number of names that refer to its sensitivity to light: Poor Man's Weatherglass in Somerset, Weatherflower in Dorset and Wink-and-Peep in Shropshire. The flowers open in good light at about 8am and close about 3pm. They will close or remain closed in dull, wet, or humid conditions.

The five petals have a reddish-purple base and there are five sepals and five stamens with bright orange anthers.

It has a square stem, the leaves are opposite and always face the light with the solitary flowers on stalks in the leaf axils.

The seed capsules are urn shaped splitting around the circumference to divide into two halves to enable the wind to scatter the seeds. The stalk, which is initially straight, curves back as the seed ripens. The stalk curve and the developing split can be seen here.

Grigson describes the split seed capsule hinging backwards like a crested skull-cap. I can see what he means!

Herbally it was used against many afflictions: toothache, snake bites, epilepsy, kidney problems to just begin. 

It was credited with relieving eye problems. In Ireland it was a "blessed herb" and if held in the hand it was said to give second sight and hearing, plus allowing the holder to understand the speech of birds and animals.

It appears in the Herbals and Vocabularies of the sixteenth century as Bipinella and its use as a cosmetic herb persisted until the nineteenth century when Pimpernel Water was used to bleach freckles.

Pliny refers to its value in treating liver complaints and the former botanical name Anagallis , given by Dioscorides, is said to be derived from the Greek to laugh and indeed the herb was used to dispel sadness. 

Local names in Somerset include Laughter Bringer and Shepherd's Delight.

If you were in any doubt about the effect of this plant here is an unattributed rhyme:

No heart can think, no tongue can tell

          The virtues of the Pimpernel. 

 

There will be new plants in bloom again next April.....

Sticky Groundsel,  Senecio viscosus

I saw this growing in a classic habitat for it: disturbed ground on gravel in a man-made habitat: a railway car park. At first I just thought it was a stunted Ragwort but then I realised it was the locally common - but never before seen by me - Sticky Groundsel. The fine ray-florets which quickly turn downwards are key to ID.

 The stem is wavy and well branched. 

The foliage is covered in sticky glandular hairs which can be seen too on the calyx above .

I read about the naming of the genus Senecio from senex meaning old man. A sixteenth century herbalist wrote:

The flower of this herbe, hath white heere, and when the wind bloweth it away, then it appereth like a bald headded man therfore it is called Senecio.

In the photos below you can see exactly what he meant. The seed-heads leave behind a round head-like shape which is slightly shiny.

The seeds are brown, cylindrical and ribbed.

 This member of the Asteraceae family is a naturalised neophyte. It was recorded in Britain by John Ray in 1660 who noted it was plentiful in the Isle of Ely. It may be native on sandy and gravelly soils. 

Here it probably came in on the gravel/ chippings for the car park and it is thriving. Several plants are in the vicinity of this one.

It has the following local names: Ashwort which is interesting, Stinking Groundsel interesting and helpful, and Sticky Ragwort probably unhelpful! 

Black Nightshade, Solanum nigrum

A member of the Solanaceae family this is a native and introduced. Here it sprawls through a hedge near the old railway line down to Lydney Harbour. It is a common annual and a cosmopolitan one spreading almost around the globe in appropriate habitats. Wikipedia says it is native to Eurasia and introduced to the Americas, Australasia and South Africa.

It has white petals initially spread flat then bent back. The anthers are long and yellow. There is a single lime-green semi-globular style protruding from the anthers.

The stem is a dark purple-black, variably hairy and the leaves dark green, wrinkly and variably toothed.

 

It has the reputation of being poisonous and it was called Petty Morel by the older herbalists to distinguish it from Great Morel - Deadly Nightshade. Culpepper warns "Do not mistake the deadly nightshade for this, if you know it not, you may then let them both alone"! It contains Solanine in varying strengths according to the season. Most cases of poisoning result from eating the leaves or unripe fruit. The green unripe fruit can be seen forming here. The berries turn a shiny black when ripe.

It has a long history of medicinal use but was considered a risky remedy. One or two grains of dried leaves were infused with boiling water and used to induce sweating. Bruised fresh leaves applied externally were said to ease pain and inflammation. In the Middle East the leaves were applied to burns and ulcers.  

Surface applications are considered much safer than internal ones!

I plan another blog on plants of Gloucestershire soon. Thank you for reading this one.

Acknowledgements

Simon Harrap's Wild Flowers

Stace 4

Grigson The Englishman's Flora

Mabey Flora Britannica

Wikipedia

http://botanical.com/

http://seasonalwildflowers.com/

http://wildflowerfinder.org.uk/

http://www.wildflowerweb.co.uk/

www.brc.ac.uk 

Silverweed, Square-stalked St John's-wort and Round-leaved Mint

These three natives grow on woodland rides in Vicar's Allotment at Trellech near Monmouth: the first two within a metre of each other. The Allotment is on Victorian maps but all these plants are on or near modern forestry tracks.

• Silverweed, Potentilla anserina
• Square-stalked St John's-wort, Hypericum tetrapterum
• Round-leaved Mint, Mentha suaveolens

Silverweed, Potentilla anserina

This plant from the Rosaceae family is so common as it is happy to grow in many types of soil and so recognisable I did wonder about including it in the blog but then I discovered its rich history. Botanical details first! The first two photos were taken in late August on a wet track side. The flower is five petalled and the petals are about twice the length of the sepals. This one is looking a little worn and was the last in bloom. 

The uppersides of leaves vary from silvery, especially earlier in the season as here, to dull green. Most silver leaves had faded by mid September.

They are pinnately cut into 3-12 pairs of oval, toothed leaflets interspersed with additional tiny leaflets which can be seen below.

All of the subsequent photos were taken in mid September in order to focus more on the leaves. The underside seems to show the form better.

The underside of the leaves is usually silvery white. In this colony all of them were.  

The underside is covered with very fine white hairs. The saw toothed leaflets are clear here as well as the additional tiny leaflets.

The history of this common plant is amazing. It was reputed to be picked by Roman soldiers and used as a padding in their boots. This perhaps gave rise to the local name Traveller's Ease in Warwickshire. 

Potentilla means powerful despite its size and anserina means pertaining to geese which enjoy it: hence the local name Goose-grass in Somerset, Gloucestershire, Yorkshire and many other counties.

Until the end of the nineteenth century the roots were eaten in times of famine especially in the Scottish highlands and islands. It was said in North Uist a man could keep himself fed on a square patch of land of his own length by growing Silverweed. It was cultivated and very important in the diet of people in Scotland before potatoes became common in mid eighteenth century.

Roots were baked, boiled, roasted, dried and ground into a rough flour for bread or porridge. They taste a bit like parsnips.

It has astringent, anti-catarrhal, anti-inflammatory and diuretic properties. The dried leaves can be used to relieve sore throats, gum infections and mouth ulcers. They can also be used as a compress. Even more detail is available on the Plantlife website: link at the bottom. 

Pass Silverweed with a respectful nod next time!

Square-stalked St John's-wort, Hypericum tetrapterum

This member of the Hypericaceae family is growing within a metre or so of the Silverweed. It too likes the damp edge of the woodland track. The main ID point is the square stalk with narrow but distinct wings on the angles. The stem is also reddish.

Leaves more or less clasp the stem.

The petals are pale yellow while the sepals are narrow and pointed.

In mid September the plant had moved on to fruit and the sepals can be seen very clearly. Perhaps some of the black glands along the leaf edges are clearer too.

Round-leaved Mint, Mentha suaveolens 

From the Lamiaceae family, I believe this to be Round-leaved Mint and it was accepted as such on #Wildflowerhour on 30/8/20 but there are hybrids. Happy to hear from anyone who on examining a larger range of photos has an opinion! 

Leaves are roundish: slightly less than a circle, suborbicular, or oblong-ovate. They are hairy as are the stems which branch frequently.

The leaves are stalkless or have very short stalks.

The following macro photographs were taken in mid September.

The leaves are strongly rugose and appear from above to have rounded teeth but they are bent downwards like cats' claws. No other Mint has this ID feature except for a few hybrids between this and other species of Mint.

The pale flower heads are spike-like and congested. The calyx appears to be bell-shaped and the flowers, in whorls, have 4 petals with filaments tipped by a red to purple anther.

The style is white and splits into two stigmas at the end.

It would be good to hear from anyone who has an opinion on the ID. Hopefully there is enough information to decide. 

This concludes the look at three plants in Vicar's Allotment near Monmouth. The next blog should cover plants found in Gloucestershire.

Acknowledgements

Harrap's Wild Flowers

Stace 4

https://www.plantlife.org.uk/uk

https://www.first-nature.com/

https://www.naturespot.org.uk/

https://wildflowerfinder.org.uk/

http://www.seasonalwildflowers.com/

http://botanical.com/