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Silene vulgaris
This pretty flower is named after the inflated bladder-like sac behind the petals. Growing between 60cm and 1m tall this white wildflower is also known as ‘Maidens Tears’, ‘Cowbell’, and ‘Common Bladder Catchfly’ even though it doesn’t technically catch flies!
Bladder Campion is a perennial wildflower with a green bladder-like calyx with purple veins make it easily identifiable. The ragged looking white flowers, which grow at the end of the bladder, have five two-lobed petals and are roughly 2cm wide with long protruding stamens. It is said they have an aroma similar to that of cloves. Many flower heads can be found on one medium height plant. Its stalkless bluish-green leaves are long and thin on mature plants.
It is fairly common in Britain, but is mostly found in the south of England in meadows and fields, and along roadside verges, dry banks, and hedgerows.
Leucojum aestivum
Summer Snowflake has dainty bell-shaped flowers which are white in colour.
It flourishes in boggy areas, as well as in riverside marshes and wet open woodland. Despite its common name it actually flowers from April to May.
Andromeda polifolia
Bog Rosemary is a beautiful relative of heather, with delicate pink bell-shaped flowers. The rosemary-like foliage of this wildflower never fails to enchant those lucky enough to find it during its brief flowering in late spring. The upper sides of the leaves are a similar grey-green and the undersides are silver.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, Bog Rosemary is often found in bogs. It is confined to central Britain, from mid-Wales (especially Cardiganshire) to southern Scotland. One of the special plants of the central Irish peat-bogs, it is rarer in the north, but occurs in Tyrone.
Bog Rosemary is a declining species and is a particular feature of the much-reduced bogs and flowers of Galloway.
Fragaria vesca
Before the advent of the familiar garden strawberry Fragaria x ananassa (actually a hybrid created from two American species) our ancestors enjoyed our wild, native variety of Strawberry.
Strawberry (wild) is common across the UK but rarer in north Scotland. It thrives in a variety of environments from roadsides to hill slopes to forest clearings. White flowers appear in spring followed by the recognisable red fruit in the summer.
Alliaria petiolata
Also known as Hedge Garlic or Jack-by-the-Hedge, Garlic Mustard appears in hedgerows and open woodland in early Spring.
Garlic Mustard sometimes grows to over a metre tall and has leaves that are broadly heart shaped, stalked, with numerous broad teeth, and clusters of small white cross-shaped flowers. The whole plant smells of garlic when crushed.
It can be found in shady areas of hedgerows and waste places, and open woodland, mostly on fertile moist soils. It flowers from April to June throughout the UK, but is particularly common in England and Wales.
Garlic Mustard is still very common throughout the UK and is therefore of least concern.
Myosotis arvensis
Our most common Forget-me-not is often found as a “weed” of arable land. It is also known as Field Forget-me-not. It is a greyish coloured plant, its very small, bright blue flowers (sometimes interspersed with pink) occur in spikes. The leaves are oval and hairy, the ones at the base forming a rosette.
Forget-me-not (Common) can be found on cultivated land, roadsides, waste ground and dunes. It flowers from April to September.
Found throughout Britain and Ireland, it is more common in areas where land is put to arable use. Despite changes in agricultural practice, distribution of has remained stable since 1900, probably due partly to its flexible life history and seed longevity.
Veronica beccabunga
Brooklime has delicate blue flowers held on fleshy stems, often forming lush clumps near water. The spikes of pretty blue flowers ascending in pairs from the leaf base are a clue that this plant is a member of the Speedwell family. Brooklime is a perennial sprawling herb with a dense mass of succulent leaves. Like many water plants, it has hollow stems which help to transfer oxygen to the roots.
It grows at the waterline of riverbanks and in wet meadows, marshes, ponds, streams and ditches. It is found throughout the UK except in the Scottish Highlands.
Brooklime is doing well in its preferred habitats.
Sparganium erectum
Branched Bur-reed is a quirky looking waterside plant with spherical flowers. It might occasionally be mistaken for its unbranched relative (appropriately named ‘Unbranched Bur-reed’) but little else. Branched Bur-reed is a tall plant with linear leaves that lie broadside on to stem. The smaller male flowers sit above the female flowers on the stem.
This wild plant is widespread around the UK, growing by waters edge, ponds, slow rivers, marshy ground and ditches. Branched Bur-reed is an easily uprooted plant and so prefers slower waters.
Branched Bur-reed is commonly found in its preferred habitats.
Eriophorum angustifolium
Cottongrass (Common) is the county flower of Manchester. Its white plumes are a familiar sight in wet hollows on the moors above the city. They are an emblem both of their boggy habitat and of the wide open spaces.
Cottongrass (Common) has a fluffy, cotton-like flower and seed heads which give this distinctive plant its name. Cottongrass is a member of the sedge family and so not technically a grass at all. It thrives in the harshest of environments where it can take advantage of the lack of competition. After fertilisation in early summer, the small, unremarkable green and brown flowers develop distinctive white seed-heads that resemble tufts of cotton. Combined with its ecological suitability to bogs, these characteristics give rise to the plant’s alternative name, Bog Cotton.
It is common in bogs throughout the UK and Ireland. Cottongrass (Common) likes open, wet, peaty ground and so is likely to indicate areas best avoided when out for a walk.
Anthriscus sylvestris
Frothy and lacy, Cow Parsley is a wildflower which grows in abundance along country lanes in summer. It is the earliest flowering member of the carrot family. Its tripinnate leaves are fern-like with pointed leaflets and seeds are oblong, beaked and smooth. Its stems are hollow and without spots – a good way to distinguish this plant from the similar, but very poisonous Hemlock.
Cow Parsley is widespread and common throughout the UK. It is often seen on roadsides and near hedgerows and can also be found in woodland edges.
Cow Parsley is one of the few flowers that benefits from current road verge management since it likes high levels of nutrients (much like nettles). Sadly, this is at the expense of other more delicate species.
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