Topic: Cow Slips

[Digeroo]

Drove from Cirencester to Gloucester along A419 yesterday.  There is an almost constant yellow band of cowslips on the verges both sides,  I was an amazing show.   Millions of them.  Unfortunately nowhere to stop to take a picture.

[Palustris]

There is a section of the A55 in North Wales where they occur like that too.

[Obelixx]

Loads round here too this year as well as wild primroses and also "English" bluebells.  Far more than last year which is, I assume, a product of the wet winter.  They look glorious in the spring sun.

[Digeroo]

They used to grow in huge perfusion on the North Downs in Surrey when I was a child, but people picked them and dug them up and they died out.  So it is lovely to see them protected by the traffic. 
I do cringe when I see recipes for cowslip wine.  We have them in the lawn and the plants only seem to last a couple of years, so the seeds are vital.   

[ancellsfarmer]

Digeroo, you may relax in the knowledge that restorative planting has resulted in large numbers "conserved" by passing traffic along the A31 Hogs Back, especially upon the east bound carriageway from Farnham

[Palustris]

Sounds a good idea, but a botanist friend of ours who was involved with some re-planting like this was concerned that the seed source was from Europe, so the plants were not true British native stock. There are minor botanical differences between plants from European stock and British.

[Digeroo]

Unfortunately the A419 was also from seeds after it was dualled, originally a percentage were pink, but these have mostly died out as have the larger flowered ones. 

The Hogs Back brings back memories! We use to breakfast there as a child on the way to our holidays in West Country.  The car was backed the night before and we would leave at dawn.  No M25 in those days and the A31 was just the road along the top.  At that time in the morning we more or less had it to ourselves.  We would get in a few hours driving before most people got up.  My mother would enjoy a thermos of tea.

[Paulines7]

We have many cowslips in our garden and they are really prolific this year.  We collect and spread the seeds around annually.

[woodypecks]

Me too...one of my favourite wild flowers  I too spread them around and share , propagating then by dividing and sprinkling the seeds where ever I can .  Debbie :)

[Beersmith]

All together now

Where the bee sucks, there suck I:
In a cowslip’s bell I lie;

Come on, join in. If you don't know the words just hum along with the tune.

There I couch when owls do cry.
On the bat’s back I do fly
After summer merrily.   
Merrily, merrily shall I live now
Under the blossom that hangs on the bough.

Words and music by Will S. Copyright  1558. Available on stax records. All rights reserved