‘Leave it and they will come’ is a good enough adage for how wildflowers settle in to an area; carried on a walker’s boot, dropped by bird, or blown on the wind, and finding a foothold in the poorer soils, typical of wasteland, railway cutting and roadside verge. And just when the flora is as pretty as a picture along come council contractors to mow and strim it all back to a neat, bare strip. The result is a mono-specied, nutrient-enriched environment of grass or bracken with barely a dandelion in bloom and the decimation of yet another wildlife niche.
Daucus carota (wild carrot; bird’s nest; bishop’s lace; and (US) Queen Anne’s lace)
At this time of year, the big white daisies of Leucanthemum vulgare have been succeeded by swathes of Wild carrot. I’ve not paid much heed to this wildflower before as the earlier flowering Anthriscus sylvestris (Cow Parsley) is my favourite white umbelliferae. On closer inspection however, Daucus carota is a dainty, frothy and intriguing biennial with its single blood-red central floret (not captured well here as the day was gusty). Intriguingly as it matures , the seed head curls in on itself , hence the bird’s nest epithet.
Boys looking for peashooters used to be warned about not mistaking Wild carrot for the poisonous and somewhat similar Hemlock and most children could identify the latter by its purple spotted (hence maculatum) stem and pungent smell of parsnips when crushed. When golden and dry by summer sun, the hollow stems of the umbelliferous Apiaceae family make marvellous blow pipes but are obviously harder to differentiate then. I wonder how many children these days know the difference or even if they have any interest in such games.
Hemlock (Conium maculatum)
Whilst Wild Carrot and various feather-headed grasses dominate the meadow area, there are several other species tucked in here. Making up for the gangly unsightliness of Wild Chicory are the exquisite caerulean blooms whilst in the lower levels, cerise Greater and Black knapweeds, and the fluffy pink Creeping thistle thrive. The latter propagate by underground runners as well as seed dispersal but many wildflowers rely solely on being able to set seed for the following year. Hence it is these that are most badly effected by the wanton cutbacks of our wildflowers by tidy-minded councils.
(Top L to R clockwise: Wild chicory (Cichorium intybus); Creeping thistle (Cirsium arvense); seeds in the basket of Knapweed; Greater Knapweed (Centaurea scabiosa)
The wildflowers growing here are not deep in the countryside but right in the centre of London’s Hyde Park (spot the red bus going down Park Lane). It just goes to show what can flourish when an area is seeded and left to its own devices. This is how our wildflower pockets should look and in order to save them from the ravages of an*lly-retentive councils, Plantlife have institued their ‘Road Verge campaign’. The insane tidy verge policy is being disputed with a cut less and cut later urging, whilst UK volunteers are being signed up to adopt and monitor a local verge in their area.
“Crowned with rank fumitor and furrow weeds,
With burdocks, hemlock, nettles, cuckoo-flowers,
Darnel, and all the idle weeds that grow
In our sustaining corn.”
King Lear
Lying Fallow: Contrary to both post title and King Lear quote, my own sanity is more or less intact but like the meadow, blogging here has been left uncultivated for a while. It’s almost a year since I ‘lost’ the garden and whilst making do with other activites has proved to be a great release it is not without a sense of grievous disatisfaction. I’ve never been a dedicated window shopper and there are only so many gardens and flower beds I can gaze at admiringly without the urge to plot, plan and cultivate a space of my own. As such I’m remiss with visits to blogging friends whilst enthusiasm for plant posts has naturally dwindled.
My neighbour’s courtard garden is still a work in progress and I hope to do a catch up post for a Dozen for Diana’s meme before too long, as well as revisit the three fateful sisters of Old St Pancras for a Wych Elm tree post. Meanwhile I’ve turned 60 and not quite gone to seed.
Thank you Frances and Sara for your messages and also to Donna and b-a-g for stopping by with encouraging comments on my other blog.
first a comment on the Elms I couldn’t leave as comments closed, I smiled as I read your not before noticing the upwards branch I think this is something we all do as we so often see what we want to see or expect to see rather than what is actually there, thank you for the descriptions and photos of the foliage and shape of the 2 types of Elms, I love standing under trees with sunlight filtering through,
I have heard on the radio of this cutting at the wrong time and leaving the cuttings to enrich the soil, when I was in Essex recently I was surprised by all the wildflowers and loved seeing them as many are so different from those I see here, I hope they have not been cut just yet, thanks for the wild carrot description and the other flowers,
Laura I really feel for your gardenless state and do know how you feel, this is silly but I would love to invite you to a plot in my large garden to work as you wish, dreaming I know due to distance,
Frances xx
Happy Sixtyth Birthday and welcome to the bus pass clan
Island Threads read my post..Beth Chatto gardens 1 the long view
glad you appreciate the elm posts Frances – sorry but comments close after 10 days to reduce spam
Councillor’s fears over ‘unsightly’ overgrown verges
- depends on the council but only just read an article where LibDem Devon councillor Gordon Hook wants to spend his own money to cut back the verges
- and finally the offer of a piece of your garden to cultivate is a lovely present – even virtually. Thank you for all your encouraging words.
Laura xx
Firstly ‘Happy Birthday’. Hope you had a lovely day. Secondly what a lovely post. I’m very partial to wild flowers and I’m driven to distraction by the needless desire to strim everything. Although I have to say I don’t just think it’s the councils’ fault as there seem to be a lot of people out there that see wildflowers and grasses as unkempt and untidy. Crazy, I know. I had hoped tightening of budgets would mean councils cut back their spending on such unnecessary expenditure but it seems not.
wellywoman read my post..A Bee-utiful Day – Beekeeping at Humble By Nature
councils cut for health and safety reasons – like they do everything that has a glint of danger in it. Amazingly there are people who take the same dim view. I know polished and manicured is some people’s ideal but if they want tidiness they should confine it to indoors. Thanks for good wishes WW- am getting used to the idea of being a sextugenarian after a couple of weeks
We’re lucky that the verges in our country miles are left wild in all their glory. I’ve grown the dark Daucus carota Black Knight this year, they make lovely punctuation in pools of Ammi majus in the youngest border of the garden. Happy belated birthday. S x
hillwards read my post..Wordless Wednesday: Summer Morning In The Garden
it’s more a suburban disease Sara! Ahhh, your pools of Ammi majus sound like something from Coleridge.
There is no need to cut more than the first two or three feet of verge though in exceptional cases more might be needed for visibility. Then in late August the lot should be cut and after a few days, so the seed can fall, raked off – like haymaking.
One local council near us planted thousands of crocuses beside the road and then mowed it as soon as they were over – result – nothing next year!
Duncan Darbishire read my post..ANOTHER FINE MESS I’VE GOT ME INTO!
sign up to Plantlife, Duncan, and you can guard your verges against such crass stupidity
Belated Happy Birthday! I just turned 61 and wonder how those years went by so fast! Some years ago our highway department started planting wildflowers along the roadsides. Whenever I travel, the sight of all those beauties always brightens my day. Perhaps the government councils you speak of will soon wake up to what they are losing.
Belated Happy birthday to you too Deb – we are the flowers of yester year before time accelerated
Laura the long lost – strong clean prose, fabulous images and, as ever, something to learn here…..as well as nostalgia provoked and news too of you. What other blog? What of your garden? Happy birthday too. A feast for the mind indeed. (sorry been absent setting up new business) c
So glad you’ve surfaced Catharine – have missed you and your concise, staccato prose. Sounds like you’re busy blooming – have emailed you
Laura, I really enjoyed this post. It does seem absurd on the one hand that councils would strive for neat verges, and then on the other wonder why bee, flower, bird, and butterfly species are dwindling. Sometimes I think we humans lack common sense. I’d much rather see a wild and unkempt meadow, than a stripped and barren lot. Even my own orchard has been left as a relative shambles this year. In spring we couldn’t mow because the quail were nesting in the long grass. Now it’s late summer, the wildflowers and weeds are providing much needed nectar-rich blooms for the insects. It all looks a bit scruffy, and my neighbors are no doubt less than thrilled, but quite honestly, I’m always in awe of all the wild creatures that call my messy orchard…home.
Curbstone Valley Farm read my post..Zucchini Pickles
I see it as the insolence of office Clare, little people with tidy minds and little common sense. Your orchard sounds divine
Thankfully our lane was mowed only once this year, much earlier in the season. It’s really only used by the people living on it as it is a cul de sac so not considered so important by the Council. It is brim full of wild flowers right now, everything from Rosebay Willowherb to Yellow Rattle and of course lots of Blackberries coming on too.
Bridget read my post..Flowers, flowers, flowers.
sounds like a council with sense, Bridget. You can vote for them at Plantlife who are praising and shaming councils
What a lovely post Laura, though your lack of garden makes me sad. Hope you really enjoyed your birthday, and you certainly don’t sound as if you have gone to seed at all!
I know in South Gloucestershire they have been following a rule of only mowing a narrow strip of verge alongside the road to allow people to walk more easily, so we were blessed with a wonderful array of wild flowers. With councils up and down the country having to reduce costs, maybe the wildlife – and wildflowers in verges in particular – will be unintended beneficiaries?
Janet/Plantaliscious read my post..Introductions: The Front Garden part 1
Thanks for all your good wishes Janet
Good point about the cutbacks – less money, less interference in nature. S. Gloucestershire another wise council by the sound of it
Laura your post certainly shows the beauty of meadows and wildflowers which I love, but we can feel your pain at the lack of a garden. You have certainly made the most of it, but I can only imagine how it is getting to be a bit much…just the several months of winter and the lack of the garden makes me crazy…I was so excited to find your other blog….I do enjoy your creative artistic side there and now I know what you have been doing…such talent!! I will wish you the happiest of birthdays again since it is such a special time!
Donna@Gardens Eye View read my post..Bloom Day a Bust-Almost
appreciate your visits to my creative side Donna and all your kind thoughts and good wishes. Thank you
I have the same complaint, why do they insist on mowing along highways and such, when the wildflowers that grow on their own are much more beautiful?
RobinL read my post..Summer Lovin’
that’s why Plantlife started this campaign, Robin – to name and shame until councils tune in to the requirements of wildflowers and the life they support
Belated birthday wishes to you. I hope that your special day was filled with flowers and much fun Laura. Our verges, embankments and railway cuttings yield so many riches yet often have a serious struggle to survive all that humans throw at them. Can’t comment about pea shooters but we have two big horse chestnuts at the top of our road. When we moved here some 25 years ago we used to have regular visitors coming to ask if they could search our lawn for conkers. This has not happened for some considerable time
Lots of flowers on the day Anna at the Geffrye museum gardens,Shoreditch
Telling signs re the conkers -all this lack of adventure makes children dull
P.S. I am wondering what damel is as in the King Lear quote.
Anna read my post..This Week …..
it means failing eye-sight Anna
- should have typed – Darnel aka Cockle. For interest’s sake also looked up Fumitor
Wow, I am really late with the birthday wishes. Usually Blotanical prompts me, but I guess it’s really not working so well these days. During our drought this year, wild Carrot (folks here call it Queen Anne’s Lace) and Chicory took over all the lawns and roadsides. They’re both very pretty, if pesky, and I love the blue of the Chicory. Lovely images! I hope some of your wild places will be left alone.
PlantPostings read my post..GBBD: Late summer beauties
Happy Birthday for a start! And it’s easy to see why reading about other people’s gardens looses its pleasures when the grief for the loss of your own is intensifying.
I’ll have to click through to the Plantlife site. A lot of us are bothered by the impact of council mowing.
This is an especially interesting post to me because I can’t tell the difference between the plants in this group and you have given some good hints.
Lucy Corrander read my post..BEWITCHED BY BLUE
Hi there, best wishes first of all. For some reason councils in general seem to think that wild flowers are weeds and unsightly things that need to be cut down. We have the same situation here but instead of letting the wild flowers grow they replace them with cultivated flowers of all sorts. Wouldn’t it be better, cheaper, and more environmentally friendly to just leave the wild flowers there where they grow best?
Graziella read my post..Kalanchoe Marmorata Stem Rot And What To Do About It!
Happy birthday! I’m still on the hurtling to 60 side. Late to arrive here as I’m whittling away at my exploding Google Reader – only 97 to go …
In September when we go to see the spring flowers, with the tourists, we will be accompanied by freshly tidied verges. Insane in deed!
Elephant’s Eye read my post..Pig’s Ears in Dozen for Diana
Excellent post Laura! Superb photographs and also exciting to learn this in Hyde Park!
Hi Laura, it is a shame to cut back these verges when they are clearly at their best. Many of the verges around Aberdeenshire which used to be kept pristine are now left to grow wild with a tidy up at the end of the season. To be quite honest, I am not so sure if it is a case of doing the right thing, I get a feeling its all down to housekeeping finances.
Alistair read my post..Crambe Cordifolia