The many uses of gorse, one of our toughest and most distinctive plants
There’s an old saying – ‘when gorse is in bloom, kissing’s in fashion’. This shouldn’t give anybody immediate cause for concern as it’s not often that gorse isn’t in flower.
There are actually three different species of gorse in the UK - common, western and dwarf – and it’s the common gorse (ulex europaeus) that’s most widely distributed. There are probably few other plants that have such a distinctive effect on the UK landscape. Its vibrant yellow flowers are often the only splash of colour on a bleak winter’s day and the scent, so reminiscent of coconut, can be quite remarkable.
There’s little doubt that gorse is one tough plant. It frequently grows in the most exposed of places, where wind, water loss and frost damage are rife, though it has effective strategies to cope.
It’s a sprawling evergreen shrub, rarely reaching a height of more than 2.5m, with leaves that have become specially modified into rigid, needle-sharp spines. In fact, it’s so entirely impenetrable that it does a great job as livestock fencing.
Amazingly, it’s also been used as livestock fodder, though admittedly without the spines in situ. Gorse isn’t particularly long-lived but propagates with ease and can rapidly become invasive if not properly managed. Gorse is also nitrogen fixing – it uses bacteria in its roots to convert atmospheric nitrogen to a usable form. This can result in the displacement of other native plants as it tends to further acidify soils that are already poor quality.
Over the ages, gorse has had many benefits for humankind. Its highly combustible tendencies have enabled its use as fuel for cooking, while its spiky foliage can provide a suitably grippy but impromptu washing line. These of course are far outweighed by its advantages to our wildlife. Its radiant flowers attract a wide range of pollinating insects and its dense foliage is favoured and inhabited by a number of birds. These include birds of the highest conservation priority, such as linnet and yellowhammer, though Dartford warbler and stonechat are perhaps the two species with which it is considered most synonymous.
For wildlife information and advice, contact the Sussex Wildlife Trust’s WildCall service: 01273 494777 (weekday mornings) or wildcall@sussexwt.org.uk shops. Shopping for food is something I’ve always enjoyed doing, probably something to do with my previous life as a Neanderthal hunter-gatherer, much to the chagrin of Mrs Tapp, who accuses me of sloping off for a couple of hours every weekend.
I’ve long enjoyed my weekly ‘big shop’, sometimes aided by a comprehensive, if not legible, list and sometimes done on a whim. Either way, I’ve traditionally taken my time, carefully eyeing up the freshest produce, while working out what my slightly better than average culinary skills could rustle up.
But now the fun has been taken out of shopping, with popular opinion dictating that stocking up on groceries is no longer something to be enjoyed as we are living through a pandemic don’t you know, meaning that it is viewed by many as a purely functional activity, one that should be done without a smile – not that anybody would know in these days of compulsory mask wearing. Signs are now displayed outside of most essential shops, reminding those who venture in that shopping these days is now considered to be a solitary pursuit and must be done with a face covering and a commitment to not venturing a swung cat’s distance from the nearest human being.
Now that pretty much everything else is shut, supermarkets, other essential shops and garden centres are the only places left to visit during Lockdown the Third, meaning that they will be the only places that many of us will run the risk of catching coronavirus.
That fear itself should focus the mind of most people with half a brain cell meaning that anybody other than a tinfoil hat wearer will comply with the rules.
We are told to act like we have the virus and in most cases the people I have shared a socially distanced aisle with are doing just that – giving other shoppers a wider berth than perhaps they might have done in months gone by. In the places I have visited lately, there has been a marked reduction in the amount of reaching across of other shoppers and patience seems to be a theme of the early weeks of 2021.
Yes, there is still a bit too much touching and putting back of goods for my liking but, in fairness, it can be tricky to get the right sort of fish on the third shelf up if you are not six foot plus, so I for one am trying my hardest not to judge.
With the end now in sight, patience and kindness ought to be the defining characteristic of at least the first half of this year, with the only place most of us can express this being our local shop or supermarket.
Yes, it might be irritating if the bloke in front of you breaks with convention and turns around his trolley to buy the Pink
Lady apples he’s forgotten but we are all only human and we’ll be out of this soon.