Nameless Gully on the SW side of Robinson above Buttermere.
THE experts will tell you there may be up to 18.000 varieties
of flowers, plants, mosses and ferns growing in the Lakeland hills, but there
must be very few people, if any, able to recognise them all. Once I sat down on
a shoulder of Grasmoor one very hot afternoon to do a count and found about 30
within the space of a few yards, but I could only identify about a third of
them. I wish I was a better botanist. One of my climbing friends fills me with
envy by his ability to recognise mountain flowers, ferns—and even trees in
their winter garb—without hesitation. He will sometimes pause on his way up a
steep crack or chimney on a little-climbed crag to pick out of some crevice a
tiny flower or bit of grass, telling me its name and perhaps tucking it away in
his pocket for later study. A scramble up any fell side beck must give him much
more pleasure than it would do those of us who move about with much less
experienced eyes. But even a little knowledge about the flowers of the fells is
rewarding, and fairly easily obtained by a little study and patience.
Pyramedal Bugle:Kentmere.Photo Cumbria Botany
It is
important, however, that the locations of the rarer plants should not be
revealed for depredation is an increasing menace, and climbers and walkers
should never dig out specimens and should restrict their picking for identification purposes to the minimum.
Lakeland's rarest flower, the red alpine catchfly, grows on the steep face of
Hobcarton Crag, but it is not easy to find unless you know the exact spot.
The only other locality in Britain for this rare plant—apart
from a reported sighting on Coniston Old Man—is said to be high in the hills at
the head of Glen Cova in the Highlands. Hobcarton Crag was bought by the
Friends of the Lake District many years ago because of its importance as a botanical
treasure house and presented to the National Trust. Alpine Campion is also said
to grow on the crag, but this shattered pile of blue grey Skiddaw slate is
chiefly remarkable to the casual visitor for its bright green hanging gardens
of bilberry which grow here in greater profusion than I have seen elsewhere.
A
favourite mountain flower of mine is the tiny eye-bright and I have heard that
the Lakeland variety is also found in Snowdonia but, so far as is at present
known, nowhere else in the world. Probably the highest growing plant in Lakeland
must be the dwarf willow—the smallest British shrub, often barely an inch high.
This can be found on the top of the Scafells and on other high peaks, including
Helvellyn, while comparatively rare plants grow in some of the deepest ravines
in the central fells.
Classic Lakeland Gully. The G3 scramble 'Lorton's Gully'
These include alpine
Saw Wort (Saussurea alpina—named after de Saussure who inspired the first
ascent of Mont Blanc in 1777) which may be found around Pillar, in Piers Gill,
and among the rocks of Striding Edge. Botanists will tell you that among the
rarer plants of Lakeland is the shrubby cinquefoil, the only mountain plant,
outside the eyebright and the hawkweeds, which is not also found, usually in
much greater profusion in the Highlands. They say you will find it on The
Screes above Wastwater and also around Pillar Rock: at one time it was found on
Red Screes but has not been seen there for some years. Moss campion used to
grow near Grisedale Tarn although I doubt, with the tourist traffic around
there, whether it still survives.
Many of the coves under the summit ridge of
Helvellyn used to contain several comparatively rare plants but many have
disappeared during the last half century. The lovely pink cushions of moss
campion are also found near several of the least visited crags and purple
saxifrage sometimes hangs in festoons around the Helvellyn ridges. Climbing up
a mountain beck towards the ridges the walker may encounter many typical
Lakeland plants, each one growing at more or less its most suitable height
above sea level.
Euphrasia rivularis: Keppel Cove, Helvellyn.Photo-Cumbrian Botany
The common ladies' mantle of the meadows is also found in at
least two species above 2,000 feet, the alpine variety being smaller with
beauti-fully shaped leaves and an underlining of shining silvery hairs. The
yellow saxifrage and star saxifrage, which are found in the wet ground lower
down the fell, may also be growing in the gills, the former with its bright
yellow flowers and deep orange stamens and the latter with its white star,
crimson stamens and a yellow spot on each petal. The cut leafed saxifrage with
its creamy white flowers may also be found near the mountain becks. The
bilberry or blaeberry with its pretty pink flowers will probably also be
growing nearby, while on the banks and along the lower ridges will be the
little flowers that can bring so much colour to a June walk in the hills—wild
thyme, heath bedstraw, common speedwell, some of the hawkweeds and the
tormentil, the last named also being found near the summits.
And also mountain
sorrel, dog violet, angelica, butterwort, alpine meadow rue and the lovely harebell.
The hawkweeds of Lakeland are interesting. More than 70 years ago a clergyman
botanist found two species of hawkweed for the first time in Britain on the
side of Kirk Fell and they were not reported again until found in the same
place 65 years later.
For a lifetime these
two rare species—two plants of each—had apparently remained in this one wild
spot in Lakeland, and nowhere else in Britain so far as is known. The crowberry
will be found flowering n the fells in May or June and even buttercups
sometimes survive quite high up in the mountains. The cowberry may sometimes be
seen, often growing among the bilberry, and recognisable by its pale flesh
coloured flowers and, later, its red berries. And then there are the juniper,
the ling and the bell heather—indeed, many varieties of heaths and heathers—and
a long list of berried plants, and the ferns and the mosses and of course the
bracken —a menace to the farmer, but a beautiful changing carpet of colour,
especially in autumn. One of my favourite flowers of the mountains is the
delicate Grass of Parnassus, with its beautiful little petals, rather like a
bleached buttercup but the flowers faintly streaked, almost like watermarks on
writing paper.
Another beautiful little flower is the mountain or bird's
eye primrose, which has pink lilac blooms with a yellow centre and leaves
covered with white down. The mountain avens is also, particularly lovely
flower. Its pure white petals is dark green leaves contrasting with the pink of
the moss campion and the rich colour of the purple mountain saxifrage. The snow
saxifrage has been found on Scafell, Helvellyn and High Street, while the
alpine poa grass and black sedge are among the rarities seen in the eastern
fells, and the common water starwort has been reported growing in Hard Tarn in
Ruthwaite Cove. It is said that several carnivorous and insect eating plants
grow on the western side of Derwentwater. One of these, the native sundew, is
said to be capable of digesting meat as well as insect life, having perhaps
acquired the taste in recent years from discarded sandwich fillings.
In the woods above
Lodore grows, besides a very beautiful and comparatively rare fern, the yellow
flowered cow-wheat which flourishes where there are plenty of ants. It is said
that the seeds closely resemble ants eggs and that the ants, doubtless
considerably baffled, bundle them about in all directions, thus spreading the
seeds which quickly germinate. Also in the woods above Borrowdale may be found
water and wood avens, goose grass, bedstraw, creeping thyme, burdock, snake
weed, white and yellow water lilies, the giant horsetail, meadow sweet, ragged
robin and the little eye-bright.
Grasmere is a good area for ferns while the limestone
country around Kendal has produced the true maiden-hair. There's no doubt that
the ability to recognise mountain plants can add immensely to the enjoyment of
a day in the fells, in the same way as can some knowledge of mountain birds,
the ways of sheep, the meaning of old tracks, the story of the old stone walls,
the history of the miners of long ago, the movement of the clouds and a hundred
and One other wonderful things that all help to make our mountains such
fascinating places. But, most of all, we must learn to use our eyes for far too
many of us walk to the crags or the mountain tops and see nothing, or at least
very little that really matters.
A Harry Griffin: The Climber:September 1965
