Meadow saxifrage, hiding in plain sight

 

This very attractive little flower is meadow saxifrage Saxifraga granulata. It’s a species of meadows and pastures and it has been in continuous decline for decades, thanks to the ‘improvement’ of old grasslands with fertilisers and selective herbicides, which favour grasses and lead to a decline in wild flower diversity.

I had never seen meadow saxifrage until I moved to the north east, where many of the unimproved meadows still survive. There are a few in Teesdale where it grows in great profusion. It flowers in early spring, before many of its competitors hit their stride, but its season is short and it becomes harder to spot when other hay meadow wildflowers grow taller.

It tends to grow in dense groups in the grass because it produces clusters of tiny buds called bulbils (the granules that the specific name granulata refers to) when the flowers and foliage die down in July, so when they sprout next year a whole group of plants grow up where only one existed before. The bulbils are also carried around in mud on the feet of cattle, which unwittingly plant it in their footsteps.

I was delighted to find these plants at Wolsingham in Weardale last week, just a few miles from home, in a corner of a meadow I must have walked through hundreds of times over the last fifty years, without ever noticing them before.

There’s always something new to find, even in places you think you know like the back of your hand ……

Globe flower and meadow saxifrage

 Teesdale is a favourite destination for botanists in spring, principally because it is home to the stunning blue flowers of spring gentian Gentiana verna, which is usually at its best in the first two weeks of May. But the dale is full of botanical treasures, including the beautiful globe flower Trollius europaeus (below). Last week we found it in a place where we've never seen it before, on the bank of the river Tees downstream from Egglestone abbey bridge.

This has also been a wonderful late spring for meadow saxifrage Saxifraga granulosa (below). While not nationally rare, it is a declining species. We found one meadow absolutely full of its elegant white flowers, which remind me of the finest porcelain. Meadow saxifrage reproduces by seed and also by tiny vegetative buds called bulbils, at the base of the leaves. I suspect that one of the reasons why the plant sometimes reaches high densities in meadows is that the bulbils are transported and dispersed on mud on the hooves of livestock, that traditionally graze the 'aftermath' in hay meadows after the hay has been cut. 

Making hay while the sun shines on the Durham Coast

A couple of weeks ago I wrote a piece for the Guardian Country Diary and posted some pictures here of the exceptionally species-rich Hawthorn Meadows on the Durham coast. The botanical diversity is the result of a late hay cut, which allows the wild flowers to set seed. 




Today, when we walked through the meadow....

....  Durham Wildlife Trust's volunteers were haymaking, on a very warm early autumn day. 

Doing it the traditional way, with wooden rakes and pitchforks, is hard work. The smell of warm, fragrant wild flower hay was wonderful.

A little further up the coast, between Hawthorn Dene and Dawdon, they were haymaking in the National Trust meadows with some labour-saving devices.

A hay meadow going to seed

Monday's Guardian Country Diary is an account of a wonderful hay meadow at the eastern end of Hawthorn dene, a Durham Wildlife Trust nature reserve on the Durham coast. 

Most of the Pennine hay meadows are cut at around the third week of July, which allows the farmer to take a decent hay crop but also allows key meadow wild flowers - like hay rattle - to set seed. This meadow is managed entirely for its glorious native flora and so was still uncut when we visited in late August. There were still plenty of species in flower, including knapweed, meadowsweet, field scabious, devils bit scabious and hemp agrimony, but all the plants here were also producing masses of seed. 

This view was taken looking northwards .......

.......... this one is from the coast side, looking towards the wooded dene ...

.......... and this is the view to the south. In spring this field holds thousands of cowslips, together with early purple orchids and wood cranesbill. In summer meadow and bloody cranesbill are prominent. When I walked across here I counted about fifty species without even bending down to have a close look - I suspect that there are least twice as many here. 

Although it's cut very late, it still must be cut and a hay crop taken, because there is a constant rain of seeds in autumn from the wooded dene and without the mower it would soon become ash, sycamore and hawthorn shrub - last autumn's tree seedlings were already well established. 

Field scabious flowers produce these attractive hemispheres of bristly seeds after pollination

The late flowering hemp agrimony is a great attraction for butterflies like this comma.

Devil's bit scabious, one of the most attractive late summer wild flowers in this limestone grassland, and so called because the stumpy root looks like Old Nick himself has taken a bite out of it.

Although vast quantities of seed are produced by the plants here only a small minority germinate in any single year and become mature plants, simply because there is so much competition in a dense sward with so many species. The best germination sites are mole hills like this, which provide a perfect vacant seed bed for any seed fortunate enough to land on them. Every hay meadow needs mole hills.

Grass of Parnassus

Thursday's Guardian Country Diary is an account of a walk along the river Nent, between Alston and Blagill in Cumbria, taking in some lovely hay meadows and also a rather special wild flower.

This attractive little bridge is at the Alston end of the walk, where the river ......

... drops over this low waterfall. Downstream it flows into the South Tyne.

The first part of the walk leads over these high pastures towards Blagill. This is curlew and oystercatcher country in summer and their calls followed us all the way.

The return leg of the walk drops down from Blagill to a footpath that follows the southern bank of the river, through some wonderful hay meadows that had many more spotted orchids in flower than we could possibly count. The patch of purple you can see in the picture above, just below the centre, is ....

........ melancholy thistle, once thought to be a herbal cure for said affliction. Finding it thriving in damp hollows in the meadow certainly lifted our spirits because this characteristic hay meadow species is declining in many of its North Pennine strongholds, although there's still plenty of it along the uncultivated road verges that are themselves remnants of meadows. It's a thistle that has no prickles and the undersides of the leaves are almost pure white, thanks to a dense covering of fine hairs. The flower heads are as big as shaving brishes (for those who can remember using these implements).

The wet gulleys that run down the escarpment in the haymeadow were full of ragged robin ....

.... looking suitably ragged in the blustery wind. 

Downstream from the meadows there were .....

.... mountain pansies still  in flower .....

.... in several colour forms, but the plant we'd really come to see was .....

...... grass of Parnassus, which isn't related to grasses at all but usually grows amongst them. It looked like we were too early - the flower buds, like little pearls, were still clasped in their sepals ...... 

...... but eventually we found just one in bloom ......

...... allowing us to examine its most unusual feature. It produces nectar to reward visiting pollinators but it first catches their attention with false nectaries - they're the yellowy-green finger like projections with droplet-like spheres at their tips that you can see between the stamens and the petals.

The other notable feature of grass of Parnassus is that it is the county flower of Cumbria, featuring on the county's coat-of-arms.

A walk around St. John's Chapel, Weardale

These pictures were taken at the end of June, during a walk from St.John's Chapel in Weardale onto the slopes of Chapel Fell, then down into Daddry Shield and back along the river Wear to St.John's Chapel. It's a great circular walk, with splendid views, and when you get to the highest point the only sounds come from wind, water and birds.

Down in the valley, at Harthope Burn, hawthorn was still in peak blossom - incredibly late this year.

The path up onto the fell is along a wide, stony track fringed with drifts of wood cranesbill, lady's mantle and cow parsley - a natural perennial herbaceous border. Garden designers at the Chelsea Flower Show spend a fortune trying to replicate this.

In the foreground, wood cranesbill; in the background fields full of buttercups which have produced a memorable spectacle this year. Poor grass growth in the late spring prevented farmers taking an early crop, so the buttercups and cow parsley in the meadows have benefited from a stay of execution.

When we reached the highest point on the walk we were briefly surrounded by a flock of swifts that treated us to a display of aerobatics. 

The last deciduous tree on the path up - a rowan, in full bloom. Legend has it that these were planted around farm houses to ward off witches.

Meadow pipits are one of the commonest birds in the high pastures

The last flowery meadow - above this elevation the pastures are rough grass and rushes.

The views into upper Weardale from here are stunning.

The lapwings had chicks so were keen to deflect our attention.

Back down in the valley, at Daddry Shiield, burnet rose was in full bloom. This is the first wild rose species to flower here in summer and by far the most fragrant.

A haymeadow, along the footpath beside the river Wear between Daddry Shield and St. John's Chapel.

Hay rattle is the characteristic wild flower in these old meadows.

Marsh orchids, flowering on the river bank.

A young rabbit, wondering whether to stay put or bolt for cover.

Snow-in-summer Cerastium tomentosum, tumbling over stone walls in St. John's Chapel.

A perfect summer day.