Winter fragrance

In these cold, grey days after Christmas, in the depths of winter, any flower is welcome, although I do have some reservations about this one - winter heliotrope Petasites fragrans

 I planted a small cutting  in our front garden many years ago for nostalgic reasons, because it grew on a roadside near my home in Sussex when I was a child. Its creeping underground rhizomes have spread relentlessly outwards, defying attempts to dig it out because it regenerates rapidly from small rhizome fragments left behind. Fortunately, it's confined by two walls and a concrete path, which limits its opportunities from further escape, but I can see why people warn against introducing it into cultivated soil. 

It has become naturalised in many places throughout Britain, moved around in dumped garden soil, around waste tips or where it as been fly-tipped on roadsides.

On the plus side, winter heliotrope has a delightful fragrance, variously described as resembling vanilla, almonds or marzipan, so when it flowers in January I always keep a few inflorescences on the window ledge in a vase. 

It originates from the central Mediterranean region and North Africa and was  introduced into gardens here in 1806, then first recorded in the wild in Middlesex in 1835. My favourite naturalised population is on the edge of the sea cliffs near Noses Point at Seaham on the Durham coast where, on a bright winter's day, it looks wonderful with the North Sea as a backdrop.