Every Wednesday, I hope to find a new ‘weed’ to investigate. My only criterion will be that I will not have deliberately planted the subject of our inquiry. Who knows what we will find…..

Bulrush (Typha latifolia)

Dear Readers, at this time of year the most dramatic plants in the Everglades in Coldfall Wood are the bulrushes. They sway in the wind, their dried leaves susurrating as if they are whispering to one another and, when the water level is as high as it currently is, they add an otherworldly air, as if they are relicts of a drowned world.

In the UK, the bulrush is also known as common reed mace, but the plant has a very wide native distribution, from Africa and Asia through to North America. It is not, however, the plant that the cradle of the baby Moses was found in – this is most likely to have been the paper reed (Cyperus papyrus).The bulrush is an ‘obligate’ wetland species, which means that it is always found alongside water, though it prefers the depth to be no greater than 2.6 feet. It is also fond of water with high levels of nutrients, which means that it does very well in places where there is run-off from roads and farms, and can be used for bio-remediation in polluted areas.

The flowerheads of the bulrush are so familiar that it takes a moment to realise how extraordinary they are. The female flowers are the fat, cigar-shaped objects that sit around for months and finally erupt into a mass of fluffy seeds. The male flowers form a lighter-coloured pyramid on top of the female flowers – in the photo above, you can see the spikes on the plants to the left where the male flowers have already gone. The photo below shows both male and female flowers – male flowers are ‘staminate’, female flowers are ‘pistillate’.

Male and female bulrush flowers (Photo One – see credit below)

In the UK, bulrushes have not been used for medicinal or culinary purposes, or indeed for anything much at all except for adding a touch of drama to flower arrangements (or at least, this is all I could discover – feel free to put me right!) In North America, however, the plant (known there as reedmace or cattail) was much more widely used. A quick look at the Plant Lives entry on Typha latifolia reveals the following ways that the plant facilitated daily life:

• It was used ceremonially in both rain and sun dances by different Native American tribes
• The root was used to caulk canoes
• The leaves were used to make winter roofing that kept out both rain and snow
• Many tribes used the leaves to weave baskets
• Everything from raincoats to skirts was also made from the leaves
• The down from the female flowers was used to stuff pillows
• The down was also used as a weapon by the Chippewa tribe, in the belief that it would blind enemies if it was thrown into their faces
• The roots were ground and eaten by many tribes, and the first European settlers to North America were introduced to this food by the Native Americans that they met
• The male pollen was made into porridge and flour, and formed part of the staple diet of the Dakota and Chippewa tribes
• Young shoots and stems were also eaten
• Medicinally, it was used as a medicine for horses by the Iroquois, and was very widely used for human skin diseases.

Not bad for one plant! In fact, ‘Backwoods Home’, a North American website on self-sufficiency, describes Typha latifolia as ‘the super Wal-Mart of the swamp’. Anyone trying to survive on their wits in the wilderness would be well advised to keep an eye open for a patch of bulrushes, because, as the author of the piece above states, the plant provides food during any season, whether via its roots, its shoots (known as ‘Cossack asparagus’ because they were much favoured as wild food in Russia) or the young male flowerhead which can apparently be eaten like corn on the cob.

What intrigues me a little is how in the UK we seem to have ignored such a useful plant. Maybe there were other plants that could fill the same needs, without any wading into bogs and streams.  Who knows. What I do know is that I will be looking at it with a new-found enthusiasm and respect though, growing where it does, I doubt that I will be paddling out to see what its roots taste like any time soon.

Credits

Photo One – By Marshman at the English language Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2692834

All other photos copyright Vivienne Palmer

Every Wednesday, I hope to find a new ‘weed’ to investigate. My only criterion will be that I will not have deliberately planted the subject of our inquiry. Who knows what we will find…..

Primrose (Primula vulgaris)

Dear Readers, those of you who read Saturday’s post will know that I’m spending a lot of time in our local cemetery at the moment, which gives me plenty of time to admire the primroses that are just coming into bloom. They seem to favour sites where the graves themselves have practically disappeared, and have mostly, I’m sure, spread from a couple of primroses planted when the ground was first turned and the headstones, now long-gone, first erected. Close to where I first spotted the fox sunning himself there are hundreds of primroses, poking their heads through the moss and dead leaves like so many eager fishes.

The late Oliver Rackham suggested that primroses will only really prosper where the soil is rich, and where there are higher than average levels of mineral nutrients. If this is so, maybe the primroses are taking advantage of the recycling of the bodies of those who died so long ago. In Flora Britannica, Richard Mabey notes that the Victorians often planted primroses on the graves of children, which adds a note of melancholy to those patches of prettiness.

The name ‘primrose’ means ‘first rose’, referring to the way that the plant is one of the first spring flowers to come into bloom (though it is not, of course, a rose, being a member of the Primulaceae family). This family includes, to my surprise, such dissimilar plants as cyclamen, pimpernels and creeping jenny.

Primroses come in many different forms, as anyone who has visited a garden centre lately will know. The popular, brash polyanthus is a cross between the native primrose and primula veris, the cowslip. How all those reds and blues came to be is anybody’s guess, but there is a fair amount of diversity even among wild plants. The yellow ‘eye’ in the centre of the plants above can be found in native primroses, but may also have been bred for. There are also occasional ‘rhubarb and custard’ primroses amongst the cream and yellow ones, which I can only imagine have popped up by themselves, over time.

Note the pink primroses!

A fine selection of polyanthuses. Or polyanthi. Who can say?

April 19th is Primrose Day, which makes me happy because it is also my brother’s birthday. A bouquet of primroses is placed on Disraeli’s statue outside Westminster Abbey, because these were the politician’s favourite flower. They are also strongly associated with Easter, and, along with daffodils and chocolate eggs, seem to be a popular component of presents over the season. Primroses are also the county flower of Devon.

As I mentioned in last year’s post about the Cowslip, primroses come in two forms: Pin flowers and Thrum flowers. For pollination to be successful, it needs to be between flowers of different forms. Each plant will be either a Pin plant or a Thrum plant. In this way, the plant ensures that it cannot pollinate itself, a fact that helps to ensure diversity.

Thrum form of primrose (via wiki)

Pin form of primrose

The leaves and flowers of primroses are said to be edible – certainly the blooms would make a lovely addition to a spring salad (maybe with some English asparagus if there’s any about). In The Ecologist, there’s a lovely (and very honest) article about the joys of cooking with something as delicate as a primrose flower by Susan Clark, and the end result is a primrose meringue nest drizzled with primrose honey, which sounds absolutely delightful. Do have a look at the article here. It made me roar with laughter.

A delicious dish called ‘primrose pottage’ was made from rice, honey, almonds, saffron and ground primrose flowers, and very delicious it sounds too.

The flowers can also be used to make primrose wine, which sounds like one of those drinks that you  pack in a picnic basket and drink under a fine old oak tree while the bees buzz languidly past. Well, I can dream. Most of my picnics involve knocking over the wine, noticing that the cream has gone off, being visited by curious and very muddy cows and suddenly realising that one of those cows is actually, well, a bull.

However, before you rush out with a wicker trug, wearing your best bonnet, to gather primrose flowers, note that they are protected under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981, which makes it illegal to pick wild primroses or remove them from the wild. Best to get planting in your back garden I think, though as you need 350 primrose petals to make 5 litres of wine I hope you have an extensive acreage.

The primrose also has a long history as a medicinal plant. A Modern Herbal explains that, for Pliny, the primrose was almost a panacea for the treatment of paralysis, rheumatism and gout. Culpeper described how the leaves ‘made as fine a salve to heal wounds as any I know’. Another renowned herbalist, Gerard, notes that primrose tea, ‘drunk in the month of May is famous for curing the phrensie’. So next time you are visited by the phrensie, you know what to do.

So, as I go on my nightly visits to the cemetery for jam sandwich distribution, I am much heartened by the companionship of the primroses, which seem to glow in the half-light. I walk back from my mission, scuffing through the dead leaves and watching the wood pigeons fighting over the ivy-berries. And all along the way, the primroses edge the path, and extend off in every direction. If this is Shakespeare’s ‘primrose path of dalliance’, I am all for it.

Every Wednesday, I hope to find a new ‘weed’ to investigate. My only criterion will be that I will not have deliberately planted the subject of our inquiry. Who knows what we will find…..

Grape hyacinth (Muscari armeniacum)

Dear Readers, this is, of course, a garden plant which pops up all over the place in churchyards and close to habitation, but what a pretty one! The tiny flowers, each the colour of lapis lazuli, are delicately fringed with white, and remind me a little of old-fashioned lady’s bloomers. The name ‘muscari’ comes from the Greek word muskos and refers to the scent, although it is not to everyone’s taste – another name for the garden grape hyacinth is ‘starch hyacinth’, as some people thought that it smelled like wet laundry.

Grape hyacinths are not technically hyacinths at all, but belong to the same family as asparagus, bluebells and lily of the valley. Like bluebells, they will spread far and wide if the conditions are to their liking, and in my experience they are some of the easiest of bulbs to persuade to naturalise and to come back year after year. Plus, they provide an early source of nectar for pollinators, and I have often seen them visited by early solitary bees and hoverflies.

Hoverfly on grape hyacinth (Photo One – see credits below)

What I did not know, however, was that in addition to the garden grape hyacinth that we see everywhere, the UK has its own native grape hyacinth (Muscari neglectum). This is a very rare plant, found mainly in Breckland, and has flowers that are a deep dark blue, almost black. The smaller, bluer flowers at the top are sterile.

In Flora Britannica, Richard Mabey tells of one important site for Muscari neglectum at Lakenheath in Suffolk, a place now know mostly for its air-base. One area of grassland which was full of native grape hyacinths was levelled to make concrete areas for storing bombs. When the site was dismantled in the 1960’s the plants returned, and until the 1970’s, when the area was once again flattened for housing, thousands of the bulbs flowered every year. Suffolk locals apparently call the plants ‘grey parsons’, and if you try to say grape hyacinth with a Suffolk accent, you’ll see why.

Our native grape hyacinth (Muscari neglectum) Photo Two, credits below.

The garden grape hyacinth is a native of the eastern Mediterranean, from Greece and Turkey to the Caucasus (hence the species name armeniacum). In Greek and Italian cookery, the bulbs are considered a delicacy (although they are poisonous), and are either preserved or pickled in oil after being boiled. I wonder if they are used like pickled onions, to add a certain savour to cheese or cooked meat? According to the ever-interesting Plant Lives website, grape hyacinth bulbs are believed to stimulate appetite.

So, this little bulb, which cheerfully goes about its business with little intervention from us is a real winner in pots or containers, or at the edge of a bed of daffodils. However, in the famous Keukenhof bulb gardens in the Netherlands, they celebrate the  garden grape hyacinth by creating a ‘blue river’  which meanders  through the park, edged here by white narcissus. A bit over the top, for sure, but breathtaking nonetheless. I think I must redouble my efforts with bulbs next year.  If only mine looked these, I would be a happy woman.

The blue river at Keukenhof gardens in the Netherlands. Photo Three – credit below

Credits

Photo One – By This photo was taken by Ryan Bushby(HighInBC) with his Canon PowerShot S3 IS. To see more of his photos see his gallery.

Photo Two – © Hans Hillewaert / , via Wikimedia Commons

Photo Three – By Tom Jutte https://www.flickr.com/photos/hereistom/8072659107

All other photographs copyright Vivienne Palmer

Every Wednesday, I hope to find a new ‘weed’ to investigate. My only criterion will be that I will not have deliberately planted the subject of our inquiry. Who knows what we will find…..

Mahonia aquifolium

Dear Readers, there is no doubt at all that Mahonia (or Oregon Grape as it is often known) is largely a plant of parks and gardens, but I found this individual right on the edge of Alexandra Park and the north London Parkland Walk, where it appeared to be making a break for freedom. It is originally a plant of North America, and is named after ‘the first nurseryman in America’, Bernard McMahon (1775-1816) who curated the plant collection of explorers Lewis and Clark. The plant arrived in the UK in 1823. By 1874 it could be found in the wild, and it is sometimes deliberately planted as cover for game birds (much as snowberry was). With its spiny evergreen leaves, yellow flowers and, later, its bloom-covered blue berries, it is one of those plants that has some interest in every season. It also seems to tolerate clay soil, and so there are some very fine examples of the plant in East Finchley.

The plant has a lot going for it as food for animals. It is recommended by many organisations as a food-source for early emerging bumblebee queens and solitary bees. The flowers have a rather pleasant smell too. The berries are liked by blackbirds and mistle thrushes. The leathery leaves are also, surprisingly, a food plant for moths such as the Bright Line Brown Eye (once again, I am in love with the names of moths) and the Peppered moth.

A Bright Line Brown Eye moth caterpillar….(Lacanobia oleracea) (Photo One – credit below)

…and when it’s all grown up (Photo Two – credit below)

Peppered Moth (Biston betularia – white form) (Photo Three – credit below)

Peppered moth (Biston betularia – black form) Photo Four (credit below)

However, mahonia is not only food for visitors to the garden – the ‘grapes’ have been used as human food. In North America, many native tribes ate the berries raw, whilst some turned them into jams and jellies, and others dried them. Should you have a superabundance of mahonia in your garden and an urge to knock up some preserves, you can find all the details you need at the Backwoods Home website. However, as many tribes people only ate the berries as a last resort, we can maybe assume that, whilst a useful source of vitamins, they are not as palatable as you might hope.

Mahonia berries (Photo Five)

The wood of mahonia is bright yellow, and produces a dye of the same colour, while the berries produce a purple one. Richard Mabey notes in Flora Britannica that one young boy used the juice from the ‘grapes’ as very convincing fake blood. One can only imagine how much the child’s mother appreciated his inventiveness.

Mahonia has also long been used for everything from gastritis to syphilis by the native peoples of North America, and  there have also been some promising recent studies into its use in the treatment of psoriasis. Indeed, much as I hate to publicise it,  mahonia medicine has even made the hallowed pages of the Femail section of the Daily Mail. Why it’s in the ‘Femail’ section goodness only knows. As far as I know, men get psoriasis too. But it’s probably just as well not to get me started on gender differentiation in the media. We could be here all day.

And there is one more thing to mention about mahonia. Some plants react when touched – the ‘Sensitive plant’ or mimosa is one example. We had one in a pot when we were children, and I remember how the poor plant would behave when we touched it, the individual leaves creeping together as if terrified and then the whole ‘branch’ collapsing . How we laughed, spawn of Satan that we were. Well, New Scientist reports that more than 100 species of plants have touch-sensitive stamen, and that mahonia is one of them. On the Digital Botanic Garden website, there are photos of the stamen contracting after being touched – the theory is that this helps to force pollen onto the legs of any visiting insects. This is a remarkably quick reaction, taking less than a second in warm weather. We often think of plants as being slow-moving organisms, but the more I learn about them, the more I realise that they are intensely reactive beings, responding to their environment with great rapidity when necessary. Let’s never underestimate our flora. They’re a lot more dynamic than we give them credit for.

Credits

As usual, I’d like to credit Richard Mabey’s ‘Flora Britannica’ and Sue Eland’s ‘Plant Lives‘ website for providing invaluable information.

Photo Credits

Photo One – By Rasbak – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1087083

Photo Two – By ©entomart, Attribution, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=313383

Photo Three – CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.

Photo Four – CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=880130

Photo Five – By The original uploader was Meggar at English Wikipedia – Transferred from en.wikipedia to Commons., CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1375500

All other photographs copyright Vivienne Palmer

Every Wednesday, I hope to find a new ‘weed’ to investigate. My only criterion will be that I will not have deliberately planted the subject of our inquiry. Who knows what we will find…..

Cow Parsley (Anthriscus sylvestris)

Dear Readers, how can it be that I have been doing the Wednesday Weed for two years, and yet have never described a member of the carrot family (Apiaceae)? It’s not as if I don’t pass these plants often, as cow parsley grows freely in Cherry Tree Wood, and Coldfall Wood.  Today, however, just one plant was in flower along the Parkland Walk, a most intriguing north London path that stretches from Highgate to Finsbury Park along the route of a disused railway line.

Cow parsley is also known as Queen Anne’s Lace, though in Flora Britannica Richard Mabey is of the opinion that this is a rather contrived name, possibly imported from North America, where the plant is widely naturalised. It is also known as Mother Die, a rather sinister title. It may be that this relates to a belief that bringing the plant into the house was unlucky, but more likely it is because although the Apiaceae contain the relatives of many of our food crops (including carrot, parsnips and celery), it also contains some of the most poisonous plants in the UK, such as hemlock and hemlock water-dropwort. In other words, it’s probably wise not to go eating the roots of this family (or indeed any other part) unless you are 100% confident of what you are doing. This may explain another regional name for cow parsley, ‘keck’ – my dictionary states that it is a 17th century name meaning ‘nausea’ or ‘disgust’. It seems that mis-identification in the carrot family has been causing problems for centuries.

The leaves of cow parsley look rather like those of ‘real’ parsley and chervil, and indeed they are said to taste sharper than chervil, with a hint of carrot. I would be inclined to leave them alone, if I were you. They are also said to form a good mosquito repellent, but again, beware – the leaves of the giant hogweed look somewhat similar (though it would be difficult to mistake cow parsley for something with stems 10cm thick) and can cause burns.

It always puzzles me when, as here, a single plant has burst into flower, months before its neighbours (cow parsley normally flowers in May in great abundance, as you can see below). So, Is there something about this particular spot that encourages precocity – maybe richer soil, or more light? Or is it something genetic? If the latter, this early-flowering would be a good illustration of the kind of variation that might give a plant an evolutionary advantage in the right conditions. At any rate, this plant has certainly got a jump on its many, many neighbours. Let’s just hope that there are some hoverflies around soon to pollinate it, or all its efforts will have been in vain.

Cow parsley in full flower (Photo One – credit below)

Cow parsley ‘Ravenswing’ (Photo Two – see credit below)

Cow parsley in its natural state

As you might expect, this attractive plant has inspired artists, including Elizabeth Sonrel, who lived from 1874 to 1953 and who painted in the Art Nouveau style. Below is her painting ‘Our Lady of the Cow Parsley’. It reminds me very much of the paintings of the seaasons by Mucha that used to adorn the walls of our family house. Only a pedant would point out that the flowers look rather more like Alexanders (Smyrnium olusatrum) than cow parsley, but if you’re looking for a pedant, you’ve come to the right place.

Elisabeth Sonrel’s ‘Our Lady of the Cow Parsley’

The Latin species name for cow parsley, ‘sylvestris’, usually means ‘of the woods’, and it is often found in the less shady parts of a forest, along a path or ride. However, it is an adaptable plant, found en masse beside hedgerows and walls, a frothy sheet of delicate white in spring. Each solitary flower is a modest little five-petalled thing, but a single plant can have up to five thousand individual flowers. No wonder beetles and hoverflies and dance flies can often be seen clambering over the flowerheads, giddy with nectar and coated in pollen. And in case you’ve never seen a dance fly before, there’s a photo of one below. The name ‘dance fly’ comes from their erratic movements in flight. Also known as ‘dagger flies’ because of their sharp protruding mouthparts, many of these flies are predators on other insects, and perform an invaluable role in keeping insects that we find pestiferous under control. So, in all our justified concern for bees, let’s not forget these other, less charismatic creatures, who make our lives easier without being noticed at all.

A Dance Fly (Empis tessellata) on cow parsley (Photo Three – photo credit below)