Vernal

It's officially the first day of spring so I went down to the woods to look for a suitable candidate to represent it. There were celandines and dog's mercury and golden saxifrage but then I was delighted to find just one wood sorrel plant in bloom, growing, as is its wont, on the mossy trunk of fallen tree. 

"Wandering through the woodlands, we cannot fail to notice a small white, delicate, bell-shaped flower, which blooms freely in the shady place, yet may often be found decking the high mountain. It is the pretty wood-sorrel (Oxalis acetosella).... It was found by Captain Parry in places where scarcely any other flower ventured to blossom.... It is a humble little flower, lowly in growth, its delicate pearl-white petals elegantly veined with purple lines.... Almost as beautiful is its bright green triplet leaf, shaped like three small hearts joined together at the points, and which spring profusely around the blossoms. It is the most sensitive wilding we have; for so soon as the evening dews begin to fall, it droops its leaves around the stems, and ever seems to shrink at the approach of night, or the faintest whisper of a coming storm. "


It's interesting that Leigh Page, who wrote the above in 1865, references the arctic explorer Captain (later Rear Admiral Sir) William Parry who in 1827 had reached the "furthest north" (for a non-native Arctic dweller), a record that stood for 5 decades. He would have noticed wood sorrel because it's edible with a sharp lemony tang that comes from the oxalic acid it contains. We know Parry was clued up about the health benefits of plants because he carried with him the seeds of mustard and cress to grow in order to fend off scurvy among his crew. I wouldn't mind betting he nibbled on the little trefoil leaves of wood sorrel himself.

This blip is dedicated to the memory of The Old Man who loved the first flowers of spring.