Ground-blue

Flora, Foxes 1 Minute

Definitely ground-blue. Because sky-blue and the sea-blue cannot rival it.

Bluebells1 May 21

Every spring, they turn the woodland floor into a carnival, swaying in their thousands in the rain and lobbing perfume into the air like so much confetti. The UK has about half the world’s bluebells, and considering that a sizeable bulk of them are crammed into the 2.5% of the country that is still ancient woodland – well, you get the idea. In early May, you cannot really tell if trees have roots or are just afloat on a fragrant sea.

Occasionally, their show adds a stichwort or two.

Bluebells2 May 21

Or frames a passing fox.

Fox in bluebells May 2021

England has an extremely rich plant folklore; even the most obscure flowers have acquired strange connotations over the centuries. Bluebells, upfront and demanding on the senses, stirred imaginations forcefully in their bell-like shape – they rang for fairies, so they said, but any humans who heard the tolling were doomed. More practically, their bulbs provided starch that stiffened Elizabethan collars and their sap deterred insects from attacking book binding.

Today, they have protection under the Wildlife and Countryside Act against commercial gatherers, although there is also concern that the introduced Spanish bluebell is hybridising where it escapes from gardens. But mostly the blue show goes on. And it is, as you can see, almost entirely blue, except for the odd moments when it is white.

Bluebells3 May 21

Like white wave caps on the woodland sea.

Published by Adele Brand

Wildlife researcher and writer. I let the animals tell their own stories.

Published

17 thoughts on “Ground-blue”

  3. Hello Adele,

    booked a cottage in Grasmere and the ferry Amsterdam – Newcastle today. Happy to come back in September.

    Hope to meet some foxes in the tarns and fells. 😁

    Greetings from East Westphalia,

    Rainer

    Alter Hof 6 33142 Büren-Wewelsburg 0172 7407210 02955 4429650 rainerboettchers.de textura-media.de

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  5. I have always envied those bluebell woodlands in the UK. We do have bluebells here in New England but nothing even remotely like what you have. I have a couple in the small wooded area behind our house but am lucky to get more than a dozen blooms. Maybe in another ten years. 🙂

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    1. Thanks Darko. This is the cubs’ world when they first emerge from their earths. I wonder if they find it odd when all the bluebells disappear shortly afterwards!

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