Marsh Marigold

If you take a stroll up to Mountjoy you will see these cheerful plants around the edges of the pond. They have been in flower for well over a month now and provide early sources of nectar for bees.

Its Latin name, Caltha, is derived from the Greek for ‘goblet’, giving it another common name ‘Kingcup’.

This commonly found plant is a member of the buttercup family and can be successfully grown in the garden in damp spots or, like these ones, on the edges of ponds.

(Text and photo: Steve Ansdell)

Spring Woodland Wildflowers

Any of the University's extensive mature woodland areas are a pleasure to visit in Spring. Not only does birdsong fill the air but the common spring flowers are showing their heads and brightening up the lengthening days.  Earliest out is the wood anemone.

Then the bluebells follow.

Perhaps the best bluebell show of all is in Great High Wood, which has a good footpath network readily accessible from the Mountjoy site (follow the track that angles off the main site road just past the smaller of the car parks adjacent to Engineering) or cut into the woods from Hollingside Lane just past the entrance to the Botanic Garden.

It is also well worth stopping to take a close look at the beautiful smaller white flowers of the wood sorrel.

Butterbur, Petasites hybridus

These conical pink flower heads, belonging to butterbur Petasites hybridus, appear in large numbers in April all along the riverbank at the Durham University Sports Centre at Maiden Castle. The plant  spreads via creeping underground rhizomes and is unusal in existing as separate-sexed plants. The flower above is male, while the one below is a female. Females are easiest to spot after they have been pollinated, when the flower stalk rapidly elongates and the plant carries tufts of downy, wind-dispersed seeds. After flowering has finished the plants produce very large leaves, that were once dried and used for wrapping butter - hence the common name.

False oxlip

Until the beginning of the 1970s the area on the Science Site around the Library and the Calman Learning Centre was the university botanic garden, adjacent to the Botany Department which was located in the Dawson Building. The primroses that you can find flowering in April alongside the hedge that flanks South Road are a legacy of the old botanic garden and of the research of the late Dr. Jack L. Crosby, Reader in Genetics, who was a notable authority on the genetics of Primula , an expert on plant population genetics and was one of the first to use computers in this branch of plant sciences.

Most of the plants along the hedge are either primroses (Primula vulgaris) or hybrids between those and cowslips (P. veris), which are known as false oxlips Primula veris x vulgaris. True oxlip (P.elatior) is a rare species confined to a diminishing number of woodland locations in the east midlands but false oxlips tend to occur wherever primroses and cowslips grow side-by-side. Where the species overlap plants with every combination of intermediate characters are produced, by a process known as introgression.

There are also some magenta primula species of unknown origin amongst the false oxlips and from time to time this species also hybridises with the false oxlips, producing pink-flowered plants. This exactly mimicks the way in which the garden polyanthus, with its wide range of flower colours, arose.

Greater celandine

This plant, greater celandine, grows in the hedgerow near the Stockton Road entrance to the Science Site, just across the road from the site of the new gateway Building. Unlike the familiar lesser celandine which is a member of the buttercup family, greater celandine is a member of the poppy family and like opium poppies bleeds latex if it's damaged ..... but in this case the latex is bright orange.

Greater celandine is an uncommon plant in County Durham and is usually found close to human habitation. It has a long history of use in herbal medicine, when its caustic latex was used to treat warts, and the plants growing on the Science Site are probably garden escapes.

Himalayan Balsam

Himalayan balsam was introduced into Britain's gardens in 1839 and has since spread throughout the length and breadth of the United Kingdom, along the banks of rivers. The walls of its seed pods develop internal tensions as they dry out, so when they are ripe they explode at the slightest touch and scatter seeds in all directions. The flowers provide a rich source of pollen and nectar for bees in late summer and early autumn. Until recently it was assumed that the spread of this plant might have a devastating effect on native riverbank wild flowers but recent studies indicate that it has a relatively minor impact, and that removing it could create open habitat for more aggressive and damaging weeds. The plant grows along the bank of the River Wear, especially between Millburngate and Prebends bridges, and there are small colonies on university land - at the top and bottom of 'Cardiac Hill' on the Science Site, for example.

Cowslips

Cowslips have been deliberated planted under the trees on the north side of John Snow House on the Science Site and the dense population that has now developed produces a good crop of seeds, so these attractive grassland wild flowers are steadily spreading outwards from their original site of introduction.

Gorse

I suspect that many University staff and students are not fully aware of the extent of the University Estate - for example - Whinney Hill. Here, it's gorse patch is in full bloom.

One of the pleasures to be had from a close encounter with gorse is the wonderful vanilla/coconut smell of the blossom. Another good reason to have a closer look is the flowers themselves. A member of the pea family, the flower structure is typical with a broad petal at the back and a sort of keeled structure in front which holds the reproductive parts of the flower (the male stamens which produce the pollen and the female stigma/style/ovary combination which produce the fruit.)

The flowers need a reasonably heavy insect to operate the pollination process. A bumblebee is ideal. As it lands on a flower and pushes its way in to reach the nectar reward (it's a con trick - there is none!), the bee's weight releases of a sort of trigger mechanism and the stamens spring up under the body of the bee and coat it with pollen. The bee then carries this off to the next flower and the pollination is done.

You can tell which flowers have been visited if you look closely. The left hand flower below remains untouched but the one on the right has been had. Try it with your finger next time you pass a gorse bush.

Wood anemones

Wood anemones are the first wild flowers to bloom in Durham University's woodlands, often in early March, long before the bluebells flower. There are some particularly fine patches of wood anemone in Little High Wood, on the hill to the south of the Science Site.

The Roman naturalist Pliny the Elder, writing in his Naturalis Historia, recorded the ancient Greek belief that the winds that blew in spring brought these flowers into bloom - which is how anemones came to be named after the Greek word for wind, anemos, and why they are still sometimes known as windflowers. The flowers are carried on very slender stalks and tremble in the slightest breeze.

Wood anemones grow very slowly, from a creeping rhizome that extends just a centimetre or two each year, so some of the large patches in Little High Wood are likely to decades old.

Bluebells

Hollingside Wood hosts one of the finest displayed of bluebells in North East England. In late April and early May, take a lunchtime walk to the end of Hollingside lane, beyond the Botanic Garden, descend the steps into the wood and follow the footpath back towards Houghall. You'll find yourself amongst a sea of bluebells, in a woodland that's as fragrant as a florist's shop. If you sign up to the free e-news service provided by the Botanic Garden, you'll receive notice of the best time to see the bluebell display, as well as other events in and around the garden. Details are at  http://www.dur.ac.uk/botanic.garden/whatson/enews/

All the flowers that you can see were formed inside the bulbs early last summer, before last year's foliage died down, and they've been sitting there, primed and ready to grow, all through winter. By July the flowers will have set seed, the leaves will have withered away and the spectacle will be over for another year.

There's also a fine display of bluebells in Little High Wood, behind the Calman learning centre and below the School of Biological and Biomedical Sciences. Biology and Psychology students, labouring up the infamous 'Cardiac Hill', can console themselves with the thought that there are few other university campuses where the path to enlightenment is strewn with bluebells.