FIELD NOTES
APRIL 2002 continued....
ARTICLES
In Search of those Special Spring Flowers
By the time this newsletter comes out, spring will be well and truly with us. If you have not been out yet, then you might already have missed several specialities, like the sweet-scented flowers of Spurge Laurel in chalky hedge banks, or the bi-coloured flowers of Sweet Violet - sometimes white with a purple spur, sometimes just deep violet, but always scented.
Hertfordshire's woodlands are under-rated, but we are very fortunate that we have so many, and that a lot of them are open to the public, or have footpaths through them. Now is the time to take a look at their other violets. The Early Dog Violet should still be out - with its pale lilac flowers, contrasting with a deep purple spur. This is the common violet of much of the north and north-east of the County. A little bit later, and on other, less chalky soils, you will find the Wood Violet. This has a pale spur, rather rounded, more violet flowers, and rounder leaves.
Later still, in May, though you need to be careful, there are a few places where the scarce true Dog Violet Viola canina still occurs. It is really a grass heath species, but because so many of our woods were historically wood-pastures, it can turn up in more acidic woodland. Look out for a rather leggy violet, with runners, and with largish flowers, pale purple with a yellow-white spur like the Wood Violet. Last year it turned up in the rides in Bramfield Woods, and it could be elsewhere.
The native Daffodil might also still be out. With so many planted cultivars, people tend to dismiss the native ones as introduced. Around Ayot St Lawrence, there are hedgerows and copses full of them. Golden Parsonage near Flamstead is also a well known site, although many of its old pastures have now been sprayed out. But they can turn up on mildly acidic loams in other places. Some woods are even named after them - usually called "Dilly Wood" or similar. Have a close look at an Ordnance Survey Pathfinder map and see if you can find one!
Now, though, you might just come upon a native colony of the wild Solomon's Seal, at least in the Chiltern foothills. Early floras have dismissed these too, because there are so many garden hybrid escapes, but I have seen the real thing alongside wild daffodils in a few places. One site is Tom's Hill near Ashridge.
This is also the time of year to make the pilgrimage to one of Hertfordshire's most famous wild flower spectacles: Church Hill at Therfield Heath, to see the Pasque Flowers in their native setting. With the hard work of several generations of conservationists and now sheep, we have one of the best shows of this in Britain. There could be upwards of 15,000 of them. You have to go to the right place - out to the west end of the Heath, through Fox Covert Nature Reserve, and out along the crest of Church Hill. You will only find them to any extent on the south and south-west-facing slopes of the hill. This is because they are characteristic of chalk grassland which has recently received the first warmth of spring.
Before competitors can grow, these lowly plants produce their flowers and set seed. The native sort here is in my view far better than the straggly thing with insipid flowers which comes from Europe and is sold in garden centres. Our one has beautiful deep purple flowers, crowned with yellow stamens, and its neat, feathery hairy leaves are smaller, on shorter stems. Try not to tread on them - and please don't pick any! This is one of our rarest wild flowers, even if this site has so many of them. Where once they turned up even on some field banks, now they are down to just this one site in Herts. Good plant hunting, and let me know if you see anything unusual!
Trevor James
County Vascular Plant Recorder
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