The prima rosa, meaning first rose, or first flower of the year, is a perennial herb that can flower for an extended period, beyond its typical late winter to spring, with continued and consistent deadheading of flowers.
The typical primrose displays pale yellow flowers but can naturally have white or pink flower forms. Common these days, due to the apparent free hybridisation with cultivated varieties are bright yellows, reds, and purples.
There are many local names for this species, such as butter-rose and green jackets in Devon and simmeren in Yorkshire, however it seems that the closest to Wiltshire that had a variation on the name is that of primerole, harking from over the western border in Somerset.
Traditions are slowly dying but can still be seen in places such as Ireland where it is custom to scatter primrose or cowslips outside the front door on May Day. In Beverley, Yorkshire, a custom from 1929 has been to collect primroses from a nearby wood and place bunches of them on the tomb of St. John at Beverley Minster during the Patronal Festival.
This isn’t the only connection to the Christian faith, with primroses being used as the flower of Easter to decorate churches and in the making of ‘Pasche’ or ‘Pace’ eggs.
The primrose is a plant of the woodland edge, clearings, hedges, and coppice, as well as old heavy grassland. A plant that can be gently teased apart to make additional plants every two to three years as a clump has grown large enough. Grown in half-shade and sandy soil, the plant makes a fantastic feast for many. Bee fly species with their long proboscis will feed and pollinate the primrose, along with bees, moths and butterflies. Leaf miners will make a meal of the leaves, leaving behind their tunnels, while ants feed on the waxy coating of the seeds, the elaiosome, which is rich in protein.
In addition to being attractive to pollinators, primrose flowers display a rather interesting set of characteristics.
As the accompanying images detail, we can see that there are two different types of flowers on primrose plants. The flower on the left is called the pin-eyed flower and has the stigma at the mouth of the flower and the pollen-covered anthers deep in the throat of the flower. To the right, the thrum-eyed type, which has its sexual anatomy the other way around.
The insect collecting the nectar, which is in the throat of the flower, from the pin-eyed flower to the left, will collect pollen on its head. This pollen can only be passed on to a flower of the thrum-eyed type.
Equally, as the insect collects nectar from the thrum-eyed flower, pollen is collected on the insect's body. This pollen can only be passed on to the stigma of a pin-eyed flower, which is brushed on to it as the insect delves deep to retrieve the nectar.
To ensure the success of this approach, each individual plant will only have either pin-eyed or thrum-eyed flowers, this enforces the intended cross-fertilisation.
Segments taken from: http://notesofnature.blogspot.com/.../primroses-or...
Check out the following Instagram reel from the Woodland Trust: https://www.instagram.com/reel/Cq02WDnL5R6/...
#ForestGarden #NativePlants #NatureReserve #InternationalPlantAppreciationDay
