We’re celebrating purple for Cee’s Fun Foto Challenge this week and purple is one of my very favourite colours. From the shiny rayon fabric of my vintage shirt above, to my favourite flowers, landscapes and vivid Winter sunrises, purple colours my world.
Spring
As Winter turns to Spring, I always look forward to the purple crocuses blooming in my yard. For me, this is a sign that Spring really has sprung.
“the colour of Summer for me is definitely purple.”
Summer is when most of our purple wildflowers bloom. We see several members of the thistle family in their varying shades of purple. Thistle flowers are popular with bees, butterflies and other interesting insect-life.
Spear Thistle, or as we call it, the Scotch ThistleBee-on-a-flower – a Carder Bee feeding on Common Knapweed
Small Tortoiseshell at the Nectar Cafe … aka Creeping Thistle. That’s some spikes of Rosebay Willowherb behind too.
And here is more Rosebay Willowherb below …
The Rosebay Willowherb Epilobium angustifolium paints our roadsides, riversides and railway embankments with its purple spikes. As I also noted in my previous Purple Wildflowers post, it was the Rosebay Willowherb that led Sir Edward Salisbury, the 20th century botanist and ecologist, to coin the word “empurpled”, as he described the propensity for this flower to cover London’s World War II bomb sites.
Purple patch of Tufted Vetch growing on the cliff top at South Shields Leas
In Summer, whole landscapes become coloured in their own purple hues. Large patches of Tufted Vetch adorn the grassy clifftops along our North East coast. Nearer to home, our valley view across to the North Pennine moorland develops its characteristic purple tinge when the Bell Heather blooms.
When the Bell Heather’s in bloom the moor takes on a purple tinge
Autumn
Autumn is not without its own occasional entrant in the seasons’ celebration of the colour purple. Sometimes we’ll see clusters of this fungus, the Amethyst Deceiver Laccaria amethystea among the leaf litter on the woodland floor. Amethyst Deceiver fungus in leaf litter
Winter
In Winter, the landscape and its inhabitants may be taking their well-earned season of rest, but then it is the sky that puts on its spectacular performance in the celebration of purple. We are often treated to magnificent Winter sunrises in vivid yellows, pinks and purples.
Every season has its dominant colour in the UK’s wildflower calendar and the colour of Summer for me is definitely purple. A myriad of tonal variations of purple, contrasting beautifully against their accompanying greens, add so much to Nature’s Summer palette.
Small Tortoiseshell at the Nectar Cafe … aka Creeping Thistle. That’s some spikes of Rosebay Willowherb behind too.
The thistle family give us some beautiful purples and with their soft tufted flowers are very popular with butterflies and other insects. Creeping Thistle Cirsium arvense, in particular – whilst you might not want to be introducing it into your garden, we find is a very popular nectar cafe where butterflies and their ‘friends’ love to meet and linger – which is ideal for slow photographers like me!
Bee-on-a-flower – a Carder Bee feeding on Common Knapweed
Another member of the thistle family that we find is much loved by bees and hoverflies is Common Knapweed Centaurea nigra. Many of our family’s ‘bee-on-a-flower’ photos feature the purple tufted flowers of Common Knapweed. So you could say, it is popular with us too! The deep cerise-purple of this grassland wildflower is one of my favourite shades of purple.
Here are two thistles that live up to their traditional spiny thistle appearance while also adding to Summer’s purple display.
The very spiny Marsh Thistle, growing in damp woodland
The tall, slender Marsh Thistle Cirsium palustre decorates the stream banks and other damp areas in our woods with its deep purple tufted flowers.
Spear Thistle, or as we call it, the Scotch Thistle
The Spear Thistle Cirsium vulgare is a sturdy plant with grey-green stems and leaves that contrast beautifully with its purple flowers. I call it the Spear Thistle, as this is formally its correct name. But we have always called it the “Scotch Thistle”, as this flower is the national emblem of Scotland. Though apparently this species is by no means the only thistle that claims to be the true Scottish Thistle!
Two more purple flowering Summer stalwarts that grow quite ubiquitously in our local area are Rosebay Willowherb and wild Foxgloves. You can see the tall purple spikes of Rosebay Willowherb in the photo at the top of this post … and some more growing near the Creeping Thistle that I showed above too. Some areas of disturbed ground can become overrun with Rosebay Willowherb – it is hardly surprising given each plant produces something like 80,000 seeds! The 20th century botanist and ecologist, Sir Edward Salisbury, noted that Rosebay Willowherb “empurpled” London’s bomb sites in World War II.
My first Foxglove of the Summer – growing on a local spoil heap
Wild Foxgloves are one of my own personal notifier species. I consider them a sign of the arrival of Summer and watch out for the first ones flowering each year. This year I spotted my first flowering Foxglove on 6th June, growing on an old coal mining spoil heap we often climb when out on one of our regular walks. This heap supports an interesting variety of flora and fauna, despite its industrial heritage.
One of my son’s close-ups of a wild Foxglove growing in our local woods
Vetches are another family of wildflowers that contribute to the Summer purples. On a coastal walk recently I spotted a good number of my favourite vetch, Tufted Vetch Vicia cracca, with its dense spikes of blue-purple flowers. This cliff-top purple patch was especially noticeable.
Purple patch of Tufted Vetch growing on the cliff top at South Shields Leas
Hedge Woundwort Stachys sylvatica is a plant that you often notice with your nose before you see it with your eyes.
Hedge Woundwort
Its distinctive but not-very-pleasant smell is a common feature of the dense wayside greenery in our woods where we find it growing with many other wildflowers among the grasses and nettles. The reddish-purple flowers of Hedge Woundwort grow in a spike at the top of a single stem.
My final purple flower of Summer for this post features another landscape I love – heather-covered moorland. When the Bell Heather Erica cinerea blooms on the moorland, we can see it miles away across the valley – it literally turns the landscape purple. Here’s a closer look. This photo was taken while we were out on a Summer hike.
When the Bell Heather’s in bloom the moor takes on a purple tinge
There are so many wildflowers we see that contribute to the purple of Summer. Purple is definitely the colour of Summer for me.
This weekend’s warm and sunny Sunday was the ideal time to kick-off our Big Butterfly Count for 2014. We made our first count on a patch of reclaimed industrial land right on the edge of our village.
Small Skipper butterfly on Creeping Thistle flower
In the past this land was part of the mineral railway line that carried coal from local mines. Now it is a grassy walkway bordered by trees on one side and on the other, a field area, part of which is kept mown by the local council and part of which includes a large patch of Rosebay Willowherb interspersed with several species of grass, the common Creeping Thistle Cirsium arvense, Broad-leaved Dock Rumex obtusifolius, Hogweed Heracleum sphondylium and some brambles.
Ringlet butterfly on bramble leaf
Our fifteen minutes of sunny surveying netted us a reasonably healthy number of butterflies in this spot.
7 Small Tortoiseshells
10 Small Skippers
8 Meadow Browns
2 Ringlets
1 Small White
Small Tortoiseshell butterfly on Creeping Thistle flower
