![]() *Thanks to Encyclopedia of Life for these names. But after I have left, I hope that one of my legacies will be the continued spread of smell fox. My time at The Priory is drawing to a close – and I shall write more about that in the coming weeks. Other than a path through to the bridge, I don’t mow it during spring and summer. Like this slowly increasing white carpet on the east lawn. In Iceland, it is called Skógarsóley but I think Finnish noses ahead in the naming stakes with Valkovuokko.* (Pronunciation help not on offer).Īnother English name for the wood anemone is wind flower which is easily explained when you see a carpet of them nodding in the breeze. In French, it is Anémone des bois, in German Buschwindröschen and in Dutch Bosanemoon. There is a spot under oak and ash on the meadow which would suit them beautifully.Īs well as smell fox, Anemone nemorosa is called wood crowfoot, lady’s nightcap, helmet flower and thimble weed. ![]() It is a slow, patient spreader (though Wikipedia says otherwise) and I could easily have helped it to do so faster. I’m surprised that I haven’t thought to transplant pieces of rhizome to help speed up its colonization and introduce the plant to new areas. In England, wood anemones spread mainly by rhizome (underground stem) rather than seed. Linda, do come out to the garden and smell my smell fox, do.” Still, it’s a good name and better than fox smell would have been. I can’t vouch whether that is an accurate name, but then I rarely get on my knees to sniff low-lying foliage … nor indeed sniff foxes. This suggests one of the plant’s common names, smell fox. The latter have, so I’ve read, a musky smell. The flower has soft yellow stamens and six white petals sometimes flushed with pink above cut palmate leaves. But in the meantime, the anemone is perfect. As I only strim this north facing slope in late autumn rather than from spring onwards – as was done – they have come forth and multiplied.įlowering early in the year before the tree canopy shuts out the light, the plant will slowly die back as that light is cut off. On the wooded bank below the greenhouses, there are now several hundred flowers where, ten years ago, there was but a handful. Study the flowers first thing in the morning and the petals will be furled but as soon as the sun appears they open up their pale beauty. In their preferred habitat – deciduous woodland with enough sunlight to coax open the flowers – Anemone nemorosa line The Priory’s driveway. If not ragwort, dock and thistle then bluebell, orchid, scabious and anemone. By leaving areas of the grounds uncut for most of the growing season, I try to encourage most wildflowers. ![]() They have burgeoned in number using that simple – if obscure – technique of not strimming and mowing everything in sight, all year round. ![]() Of all the wildflowers that were already here when I arrived, the gradual increase of anemones over the past ten years has given the best reward. April brings wood anemones to The Priory and about time too. ![]()
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