Rise and rise of our native fireweed
THESE days we tend not to talk about weeds, it’s all about native and non-native plants.
The non-native poster-boys and girls are Himalayan balsam and Japanese knotweed, currently dominating the landscape.
They have really given our native plants a battering, just by their sheer size, blocking out the sun. Bee-keepers like it, conservationists loathe it.
But one native plant that was always an unpopular ‘weed’ is still around in the form of the rosebay willowherb.
You will know rosebay willowherb – a tall plant with pink flowers rising up a flower spike. The flowers appeared in June and will be around until the end of this month.
It has lance-like leaves which are arranged spirally up its stem.
It has upright rusty brown seed pods, which curl open and release silky-haired brown seeds – often more than 300 per pod. A single plant can release more than 50,000 seeds, which proves it is an obvious forerunner of Himalayan balsam.
The difference is that balsam has shallow roots while rosebay willowherb roots spread underground.
I am told the initial expansion of the plant was a result of woodland clearances around the time of the world wars.
Huge areas of forest were burned to the ground, creating perfect conditions for rosebay willowherb. This explains why it is now known as fireweed. It also did very well in bomb craters giving it another name – bombweed.
The plant was believed to be rare in Britain in the 18th century and the railway network played a major part in its expansion because of soil disturbance, which it likes.
The good thing is that fireweed is a popular plant with bees and other insects. In the old days it was eaten as a ‘green’ with meals and one Native American tribe added it to their dog’s food.
In Alaska, sweet treats like syrups, jelly and ice cream is flavoured by rosebay willowherb and it was added to tea in Russia.
Rosebay willowherb is a lovely flower and a great survivor of much trauma to areas of land where not a lot else will grow and flourish.
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