Lamiums are sometimes called deadnettles due to some of the 40 or so species having a resemblance to stinging nettles (without the sting). Above is the yellow flowered Lamium galeobdolon. The straight species has plain green leaves and is found in ancient woodlands; indeed its presence is generally an indicator that the woodland is ancient. There are also varieties with a frosty white variegation of the leaves (as above) which is a natural variation in Eastern Europe and Russia and sold under various names over here.
 Gardening books sometimes warn against planting these due to their invasive tendencies. I know several gardens (including here) where it has it has run to large patches but is this a problem? It does well in part shade and forms an excellent groundcover of attractive foliage all year round.
 In spring it throws up spiky clusters of yellow which are a magnet for bumblebees. They shoulder their way into the clam-like flowers forcing them open to feed on the nectar within.     

 Some back garden foraging. Nettle risotto with Ramsons (Allium ursinum) aka Wild Garlic in place of the clove variety and a flat bread (flour and water) with grated cheese garnished with a few leaves of Garlic Mustard and chopped Ramsons. Garlic Mustard is neither garlic nor mustard but has a faint taste of both. Ramsons have a taste somewhere between garlic and onion, particularly tasty raw with a bit of cheddar in my opinion.

 Speaking of Garlic Mustard (Alliaria petiolata) this self seeding biennial of shady spots is particularly abundant this year not only in the back garden but round about town and in the countryside.

 I've read that Garlic Mustard is a valuable food plant for the caterpillar of the Orange-tip Butterfly. I was in the garden musing on this and the fact that butterflies in general seemed to have declined markedly when I saw an Orange-tip on the flowers of the Garlic Mustard!
 I went to get my camera by which point it had turned its attentions to the flowers of the Honesty (Lunaria annua).

 Honesty is another self seeding biennial that is having a good year, I've been noticing it growing wild all over the place (like above on the allotments). Clearly something about the conditions has suited both species.
 Martin Crawford says in his book 'Creating a Forest Garden' that the leaves, flowers and tap roots of L. annua are edible though I can't say I've put that to the test.      

 I went in search of the Pasqueflower (Pulsatilla vulgaris) earlier in the week. A friend mentioned they were in flower on Therfield Heath near Royston. As the common name suggests they are associated with flowering round about Easter.
 Some wildflowers are generalists- for example there's no need to conserve Cow Parsley which grows everywhere. But others are specific to very particular habitats that have been much denuded by modern agriculture. Case in point the Pasqueflower which requires sloping chalk grassland grazed to a short sward. One of its few remaining sites in the wild is at Church Hill on the heath.

 Most of Therfield Heath is a golf course, possibly a good thing. You never hear of a golf course being built on. School playing fields yes and ancient woodlands but golf courses never. The rougher fringes of the greens are plentiful with Cowslips (Primula veris).

 Beyond the links is a small wood of tall mature Beech (Fagus sylvatica) and beyond that Church Hill which has long been noted for its colony of Pasqueflowers. Their survival was probably a fluke, the hill is too steep to be of any use for crops or golf and now is maintained as a nature reserve.
 Here the Pasqueflowers grow in drifts. Beautiful to see but hard to photograph. The sun shone and dimmed constantly as blustery clouds blew overhead. P. vulgaris is diminutive and shook back and forth as the wind raked across the hill though they were quite able to withstand the blasts.
 Appropriately Pulsatilla is a subgenus  of Anemone which are sometimes referred to as 'windflowers' (from the Greek. Anemone: "daughter of the wind").

 

 Apple blossom time...

 Dogs' teeth (dens-canis) is the curious name applied to the European Erythronium because the bulbs bear a resemblance to the tooth of a canine. Above is an American cultivar Erythronium Pagoda. The bulbs of American species have a similar appearance but this doesn't seem to have figured in the naming the plant.
 I planted a dozen or so of Pagoda in the shady "woodland" part of the garden and very nice they are too. In the back of my mind was the memory of seeing a streamside meadow near Crater Lake, Oregon last year dotted with hundreds of Erythroniums. I think these were E. grandiflorum and Pagoda seems like a close relative when I compare it to the ones I saw that day:

  

 I grow several kinds of Comfrey in the garden. Symphytum orientale is just coming into flower now.

 Sometimes called White Comfrey the flowers are indeed pure white. It grows to several feet tall, expanding to form clumps and is something of a self seeder. It hails from Turkey I believe but has become quite widely naturalised. Rather graceful as Comfreys go in my opinion.

 Symphytum grandiflorum aka Creeping Comfrey is as the common name suggests a low growing groundcovering Comfrey. Actually I wouldn't say that the florum are all that grandi but they have a lovely creamy colour. This is the first of the species to flower from early spring onwards.

 
 Symphytum Hidcote is a cultivar whose origins seem to be somewhat obscure. The flowers have a pronounced bluish or pinkish tinge.
 It's also a good ground cover and S. grandiflorum is most likely one of its antecedents. Comfreys hybridize quite freely and there are a number of them developed by breeders over the years. All the above are good in part shade and dry soil which can be useful.

 
 Bees love all Comfreys. If you want bees in the spring garden: plant Comfrey.
 

 A bumper crop of spring flowers in the garden. We've had a typically damp spring now the sun is shining like summer has come. Result: rampant growth everywhere.

 Greater Stichwort is a plant of hedgerows. I'm happy to say a small plug of it has run wild and continues to expand.

 The pink/purple flowers of Honesty seed themselves around the garden. The blue forget-me-not like flowers behind are Green Alkanet which spreads vigorously.

 The graceful Narcissus Thalia is still in flower.

 As is the patch of Anemone blanda (which also comes in shades of blue but I prefer the white form).

 Red Campion, still a common wildflower in parts of the countryside and an attractive plant for the garden.

 Three-cornered Garlic is regarded as an invasive weed in parts of the UK. I'll write an entry on this topic at some point because quite a few of the plants I love are "invasive" and there are two sides to that coin.

 Garlic Mustard is a biennial which self seeds in shady spots around the garden. The leaves taste of garlic and mustard. I might add some to a salad later. NB Plants should only be eaten when absolutely certain what it is and if edible!

 Great Wood Rush. I bought some clumps of this from Shipton Bulbs and I cannot improve on their description: "tussocks of glossy long narrow leaves and thin stems of tiny chestnut-brown flowers, this makes a fine feature in a woodland area".

 Some people would say this is a weed. Some people have no poetry in their soul.

 Two of our most lovely wildflowers should be blooming about now. They grow in thousands upon thousands but only in a handful of places that suit them and which have survived to the present day.
 The Snake's-head Fritillary (Fritillaria meleagris) likes well drained meadows which flood in winter. One such (and probably the most famous) is in the grounds of Magdalen College, Oxford. It's a glorious sight to behold.
 The Summer Snowflake (Leucojum aestivum) also likes areas that flood in winter but favours marshy wooded habitats which remain boggy throughout the year. Its stronghold is along the banks of the River Loddon in Berkshire where it is known locally as the Loddon Lilly.
 Like all wildflowers (and plants generally) peak flowering can vary by a week or two or more according to the kind of year we've been having. Both the photos above are taken from more extensive entries this time last year on April 17th. and 18th. so I'm contemplating making return visits in the next few days...       

 Two autumns ago I planted Narcissus Thalia bulbs in the lawn (or perhaps I should call it a grassy area). The pure white flowers were a striking addition to the garden in spring last year and have proved to be so again this time round.
 They are translucent with the sun fully on them but just as beautiful in the half light of dawn...  

 Two good plants for dry shade. Wood Spurge (Euphorbia amygdaloides var. robbiae) has glossy dark green leaves throughout the year and throws up luminescent lime green and yellow flower heads through spring and early summer.
 Stinking Iris (Iris foetidissima) is also evergreen though its sword-like fronds look a bit wan after winter. It's tough as old boots yet the flowers in early summer are pale and delicate of hue. More striking are the bright orange/red berries which appear in autumn and hang in clusters for months before they drop.  

 Spring flowers have been popping up all over the garden the past week or two. The days are getting longer, the weather's getting warmer (a bit) and there's been plenty of rain...

 Dorset's ancient holloways (or sunken lanes as they are also called) were the subject of my recent entry on March 26th. As mentioned I walked from Symondsbury to North Chideock via the holloway known as Hell Lane which is particularly deep and atmospheric.
 Then I followed another holloway (shown above) into the Marshwood Vale. At the start it was a farm track but further on it became so overgrown that I had to take to the fields and walk alongside it- I would have needed a billhook to proceed along the path such as it was.
 I took a particular interest in this territory because it is the setting for the classic novel "Rogue Male" written by Geoffrey Household and published in 1939. The protagonist of this thrilling yarn is an unnamed English huntsman who decides to embark on what he regards as a "sporting stalk". This leads to his capture in an unnamed country on the continent lining up an unnamed dictator in the sights of his rifle.
 Injured and on the run he makes it back to London where an attempt is made to kill him. He decides to go to ground in Dorset which he knows well ("It is a remote country, lying as it does between Hampshire, which is becoming an outer suburb, and Devon which is a playground"). Even here he is pursued by a relentless and resourceful assassin, the dastardly Major Quive-Smith. He makes a subterranean hide out in the sides of a particularly overgrown holloway in the Marshwood Vale.
 Numerous place names are mentioned in the novel and it is possible to follow the pursuit on a map. As it happens it traverses the very stretch of countryside I have known since childhood from Weymouth to Lyme Regis. When I first encountered this novel I was initially enjoying it as a good thriller then became fascinated as the plot crossed over with my own sense of place.
 Aficionados have tried to determine the actual location of his burrow and have made a number a number of suggestions (I shall not pinpoint them in case this diary falls into the hands of enemy agents). I went to one such that seems plausible, more so when I found that it is riddled with badger setts (the only place I saw them) and in the novel our hero creates his chamber by tunneling into the sandstone and earth in a similar fashion.
 So perhaps this is indeed the right spot but some of the scenes in the novel don't quite make sense geographically, it is after all a work of fiction. I think Household took the actual Dorset landscape he was familiar with and merged it with an imagined one.
 That is something I can relate to: I've been doing it in my head since I was a child.