Thinking back on memorable walks of the year this profusion of Buttercups comes to mind. The humble Buttercup is one of the most common of all wildflowers. A scene like this would have been familiar the length and breadth of the land. Yet to find an acreage of green pasture turned bright yellow is no longer commonplace. The area can't have been sprayed for a long time, if ever. Back in May I immersed myself in its aura.

 

 Uncommon wildflowers, part five. Allium ursinum is certainly not a rare species. Ramsons can be rampant in damp, shady places but wild plants are prolific only in the conditions that suit them. 

  A wet woodland teeming -and reeking- of 'Wild Garlic' is common enough in the West Country or Wales but scarce in Eastern England. Habitat loss has some bearing on that but as a rule of thumb westerly is wetter whereas East Anglia is classed as semi-arid.

 The free draining chalky soil around Hitchin is not conducive to A. ursinum. Nonetheless there is a damp dell carpeted with Ramsons near Sootfield Green. It's remarkable to think they must have colonised this spot after the ice age and have been growing here ever since.  

 

 Starting to harvest the Jerusalem Artichokes from the allotment, said to taste sweeter after the first frosts. Each stem is a clump of five or six tubers. The smaller go straight back in the earth for next year's crop, the larger are for eating. Even so that's a lot to get through! Not a popular vegetable here in the UK but I'll offer them to anyone who's interested.

 I use them in hearty winter soups and mashes. I make a point of grating them to make them more digestible. Their carbohydrate content takes the form of inulin rather than starch so they are an excellent source of prebiotic fibre. However the digestive system cannot break it down, in effect they are fermented by good bacteria in the colon. The results may be explosive!

 Roasting Jerusalem Artichokes is an option. Dear reader, I will never do that again following an occasion I prefer not to relate in the pages of this diary. Some people eat them raw in salads. Is that wise?? However I experience no ill effects if I grate them before cooking and they add a deliciously sweet/nutty flavour to the dish. 

 

 Season's greetings to one and all. Actually, it isn't snowing- blue sky and sunny today.

 

 Uncommon wildflowers, part four. Many common species have been made uncommon by habitat loss. Meadow Clary (Salvia pratensis) is now so rare that it made the national news when twelve plants were stolen from a nature reserve in Kent. 

 By contrast the conservation status of Wild Clary (Salvia verbenaca) is listed as of "least concern" on the GB Red List. None the less its distribution is localised in southern England, rare elsewhere and declining.

 I was surprised to find a substantial colony on Windmill Hill in my home town of Hitchin as seen above. Undoubtably a survival from the rural past which became surrounded by the expansion of the town during the twentieth century. A smaller stand can be seen about half a mile away on the margins of a playing field adjoining a council estate.

 

 Today is the Winter Solstice, the shortest day and the longest night. That means that summer is coming... eventually.

 

 Uncommon wildflowers, part three. Some wild plants are abundant by virtue of being generalists. There is no shortage of Ox-Eye Daisy or Rosebay Willowherb for example. They are equally at home in the rural countryside or along railway embankments.

 Then again certain species have their niche. Case in point Burnt-Tip Orchid (Neotinia ustulata) and Pasque Flower (Pulsatilla vulgaris) grow on chalk and limestone hills where the grass is grazed to a short sward by sheep over winter. 

 Both are found at Knocking Hoe as seen here but species-rich grassland is one of our most diminished habitats. The charity Plantlife notes that 97% has been lost in less than a century. Calcerous grassland was once widespread here in the Chilterns but now accounts for as little as 1% of the total area.

 

 Uncommon wildflowers, part two. I started this occasional series with Ivy Broomrape which is parasitic on the roots of Ivy. Here is another member of the Broomrape family of plants: Common Toothwort (Lathrea squamaria), parasitic on the roots of Hazel and Alder in particular. 

 'Common' is a relative concept. L. squamaria is rare in Eastern England, a small colony in Wain Wood is the only locale I'm aware of near me. More common in other parts of the country into Wales and southern Scotland but not that common.

 Nonetheless its global distribution is huge: across Europe, north into Scandinavia, east through Russia as far as Siberia, south easterly through Turkey, Iran, Pakistan to the Western Himalayas. So this is a species that's both 'native' and 'exotic'. Uncommon in Hertfordshire but a citizen of the world. 

 

 The Hertfordshire/Bedfordshire countryside around Hitchin is largely unchanged since my childhood. I don't mean by that it's a rural idyll. What I mean is that modernity had already changed the landscape by the time I came to know it as a child. For example the field patterns are much the same because the patchwork of small fields divided by hedgerows had already been transformed into huge swathes of arable.

 Then as now there remained pockets and fragments of a much older landscape. I'm thinking of places like Knocking Hoe and Oughtonhead Common. They survived modernity because there was no point investing time and money in them. The Hoe for example is too steep to plough, the common too marshy to plant. Latterly they have come to be appreciated as nature reserves and amenities.

 

 Many grey days recently but the sunny days are splendid like on Knocking Hoe in the week.

 Amazing how this rambling rose has become so vigorous in such a small pot. And this photo was taken after I gave it a hard prune to reduce its size by about 50%.   

 David Austin has this to say about choosing a pot for a climbing or rambling rose: 

 "It must be large enough to accommodate an extensive root system, support a tall framework, and retain moisture without becoming waterlogged. Choose a container that measures at least 60cm (2ft) wide and deep, holding a minimum of 100 litres of compost".

 Good advice which doesn't seem to apply to this particular rose!

 In a way the perfect day to walk out into the blue. A cool, fresh breeze yet I could feel the warmth of winter sun on my face. I lingered awhile on the slopes of Knocking Hoe communing with eternity.

 

 Uncommon wildflowers, part one. In fact I'm not really a seeker of rare species. I'm very happy to see drifts of Rosebay Willowherb along railway embankments or woods full of Bluebells or a lawn infested with Self-Heal.

 Nonetheless it is a thrill to come across a rarity. Case in point Ivy Broomrape (Orobanche hederae) grows in great profusion in the grounds of Benslow Music School in Hitchin. That is surprising because Brian Sawford describes it as "one of Hertfordshire's rarest wildflowers" in his great book 'Wildflower Habitats of Hertfordshire' published in 1990.  

 He noted that it was "unexpectedly discovered in a churchyard in northern Hertfordshire" in 1984. Furthermore he states that "These are the only colonies of this normally maritime species ever known from the county, and the only location in the whole of the Eastern part of Britain, north of the River Thames."  

 Quite when or how O. hederae arrived at Benslow is a mystery. It's flourishing here to the extent that it's really quite common in this particular locale.