WHAT TO SPOT
Natural wonders to watch out for this week…
There is a poem by the 19thcentury writer Sydney Dobell that takes the reader through the successional emergence of spring flowers.
Dobell’s “A Chanted Calendar” begins with a primrose, then what he called the “windflower”, which is the old name for the starry white wood anemones that adorn the floor of ancient woodlands in early spring.
Then come the daisies “trooping through the fields” and, finally, in May, the cowslip “like a dancer in the fair”.
Things have moved on in the past few centuries. When I first moved into my house four years ago, I scattered some cowslip seeds in a tree pit on the street outside, and they always emerge in early April.
I love them for their cheery clusters of yellow flowers, which look shaped to me like the massed instruments of a brass band, blaring out joyful news of the world reawakening.
The cowslip is a flower steeped in tradition, which was traditionally scattered on church paths for late spring weddings or woven into May Day garlands.
The county flower of Essex, Northamptonshire, Surrey and Worcestershire, the cowslip is also said to symbolise “comeliness and winning grace”. Quite an achievement, considering that it takes its name from the fact it was often discovered sprouting near the less-than-rarefied location of a steaming cowpat.
These days, cowslips can be found in woodland, meadows, pastures and road verges. Like many wildflowers, they do well in nutrient-poor soils and can quickly colonise the dullest patches of urban scrub.
In the works of Shakespeare, cowslips appear everywhere, from the magical forests of A Midsummer Night’s Dream to Henry V, where the “freckled cowslip” is held up as a sign of a well-managed pasture.
The flower also occupies a rich seam of folklore and is variously nicknamed: Key of Heaven; Paigles; Bunch of Keys; and Herb Peter, the last of which comes from the legend that St Peter once had a duplicate set of keys made for the gates of heaven but dropped them to the ground, whereby cowslips sprouted at the very spot where they fell.
This cultural history suggests that cowslips were once one of our most common flowers, as widespread even as the buttercup, but suffered a steep decline between 1930 and 1980. Many native wildflower species struggled similarly due to the ploughing of old pastureland and increased use of chemical herbicides as farming industrialised in the latter part of the 20th century.
But the irrepressible cowslip has proven itself to be something of a comeback kid in recent decades. The flower has started returning to unsprayed grass verges and village greens. According to the conservation charity, Plantlife, “vast masses” of them have reappeared in grasslands in Herefordshire, where grazing pressure has been reduced.
Cowslips are not valued solely for decorative purposes. Like many early spring flowers they are a vital source of nectar for pollinating insects, and it is not long ago that country folk, too, relied upon them for a buzz.
The flower tips, which are scented like apricots, supposedly make a delicious wine when steeped in spring water and fermented with sugar, yeast and lemon rind.
The petals are also believed to have medicinal properties, helping cure headaches, and were once used as an anti-ageing tincture. In other words, a wine that fixes your hangover and smooths your wrinkles – a miracle flower, indeed.
The cowslip was scattered on church paths for late spring weddings