All the yellows

19 Sunday Apr 2026

Posted by sconzani in flowers, plants, spring, wildflowers

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Alexanders, British wildflowers, Broom, Cowslip, Creeping buttercup, dandelion, gorse, Lesser Celandine, marsh marigold, Meadow buttercup, primrose, Sea radish, Spring colour, yellow wildflowers

The splendid sight of road verges gleaming with the brilliant yellow of blooming Dandelions is fast becoming just a wonderful memory as the council tractors and strimmers once again destroy any wildflowers they see in the name of ‘neat’ and ‘tidy’, and this despite the loss of some devastating percentage (50%?) of our insect populations in the last couple of decades. I grabbed some photos before everything started to disappear …

Alexanders: in places like the coastal path the only plant in flower so currently feeding a lot of small insects.

Broom: this might survive as it was in a park surrounded by Brambles.

Cowslips: in a country park so surviving, and looking very lush.

Creeping buttercup: gone.

Dandelion and Lesser celandine: prime targets for destruction.

Gorse: these tend to survive until the flail gets used.

Marsh marigold: a small survivor from a more numerous population, where a volunteer group decided they would build a dead hedge. Make it make sense!

Meadow buttercup: gone.

Primrose: these tend to survive while they’re flowering, then it’s off with their heads!

Sea radish: on the Barrage so not strimmed but the many dogs like to pee on them.

In flower now

12 Sunday Apr 2026

Posted by sconzani in wildflowers

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British wildflowers, Cardamine pratensis, Common fumitory, Common Stork's-bill, Cornsalad, Cuckoo flower, Erodium cicutarium, Forget-me-not, Fumaria officinalis, Hairy violet, Honesty, Lamium purpureum, Lunnaria annua, Myosotis species, Red dead-nettle, Spring colour, spring wildflowers, Valerianella locusta, Viola hirta

It seems every time I step out the door now I notice new, different wildflowers in bloom. These are some of this week’s finds; for no particular reason, I seem to have focused on the blue / pink colour tones.

The grassy area on Cardiff Bay’s Barrage is full of Common stork’s-bill (Erodium cicutarium), looking very lush.

Cornsalad (Valerianella locusta) is blooming in many of the local areas of waste ground, proving those areas are not really a waste at all.

Just in time for the emergence of the Orange-tip butterflies that use this wildflower as one of their larval plants: Cuckoo flower (Cardamine pratensis).

One of the Forget-me-not (Myosotis) species, possibly Common (M. sylvatica), though the plant did seem very small.

A wildflower with a lot of variation in its flower colours, Common fumitory (Fumaria officinalis), also known by the vernacular name Earth smoke.

At this time of year, the east and west paddocks at Cosmeston Lakes Country Park are tinged lilac with the flowers of Hairy violet (Viola hirta).

Escaped from its original garden plantings and now adorning the edges of local lanes, Honesty (Lunnaria annua).

This was the scene alongside the bike / pedestrian path around the edge of Grangemoor Park this week, where swathes of beautiful Red dead-nettle (Lamium purpureum) are in full bloom.

Gorse and its weevil

05 Sunday Apr 2026

Posted by sconzani in flowers, insects, plants

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British weevils, gorse, gorse flower, Gorse weevil, Spring colour, weevil on Gorse flower, yellow flowers

Short and sweet today – just a Gorse weevil (because they’re tiny and cute and always busy) on a Gorse flower (because they’re so wonderfully golden and sunny and cheering, even on the greyest day).

Beating the gloom

10 Tuesday Mar 2026

Posted by sconzani in flowers, spring, wildflowers

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British wildflowers, marsh marigold, Spring colour, spring wildflowers, yellow wildflowers

Today I can finally see the sky again but for the past several days we’ve had nothing but grey foggy damp dismal gloom. I’m generally quite a buoyant person and try always to see the positive in situations but, yesterday, even I was starting to find the constant dreary weather a bit depressing, until I saw this. The big bold golden flowers of Marsh marigold are so beautiful and cheering that a smile instantly formed on my face and my mood improved for the rest of the day, in spite of the gloom.

Up they pop

01 Sunday Mar 2026

Posted by sconzani in flowers, spring, wildflowers

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British wildflowers, Colt's-foot, Coltsfoot, Spring colour, Tussilago farfara, yellow flowers

Happy Spring to those of you in the northern hemisphere, and what better way to celebrate the passing of winter than with an iconic spring flower!

Colt’s-foot (Tussilago farfara) is a member of the Asteraceae, the family of daisies and dandelions. It flowers most commonly appear in March and April, though can sometimes be seen as early as January; I spotted these flowers on Thursday, 26 February, which is about usual hereabouts. The colt’s-foot-shaped leaves won’t appear above ground until much later, perhaps in April or May.

After a long wet winter, these little droplets of golden yellow are a very cheering sight when they emerge, and it would be very easy to take just a cursory glance, smile and move one. If you take a moment to look closer though, they are very interesting little plants, with stems covered in white woolly fibres and an abundance of sepals that are a very pale maroon with green stripes up their centres.

The centres of the flowers are surrounded by petals that are fine and delicate but plentiful and, as they age, the flowers develop a soft reddish tinge that looks to my fanciful eye a bit like the colour of a setting sun, though, in this case, on the ground rather than in the sky.

Crocus flower power

15 Sunday Feb 2026

Posted by sconzani in flowers, spring, wildflowers

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crocus, Crocuses in bloom, Spring colour, spring flowers, spring wildflowers

Though we did have a blue-sky day yesterday, it’s been a long, grey, wet winter; earlier this week one Scottish city, Aberdeen, was celebrating seeing the sun after 21 days of its absence! The weather’s not been that dismal here in south Wales but it’s been dreary enough to make the sight of spring flowers even more heartwarming than usual. So, today here’s some multi-coloured flower-power Crocuses to brighten your day!

Coteries of orchids

08 Sunday Jun 2025

Posted by sconzani in flowers, wildflowers

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Anacamptis pyramidalis, Bee orchid, British orchids, Dactylorhiza maculata, Dactylorhiza praetermissa, Heath spotted-orchid, native orchids, Ophrys apifera, orchids, Pyramidal orchid, Southern marsh orchid, Spring colour, spring orchids

I was searching for adjectives to describe the many native orchids I’ve been seeing during my recent meanders, then decided that you didn’t really need my blathering to see how sublime they are.

Bee orchids (Ophrys apifera), at Cardiff’s Grangemoor Park. Note the unusual markings on the ‘face’ of the orchid on the right – it looks to me to be crying.

Also from Grangemoor Park, a feast of Pyramidal orchids (Anacamptis pyramidalis)

Heath spotted-orchids (Dactylorhiza maculata) from last Wednesday’s visit to Aberbargoed Grasslands NNR

One of just a few Southern marsh orchids (Dactylorhiza praetermissa) growing on the coal spoil tip at Aberbargoed

Kidney vetch

18 Sunday May 2025

Posted by sconzani in wildflowers

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Anthyllis vulneraria, British wildflowers, Kidney vetch, Spring colour, yellow wildflowers

If only Cardiff Bay had a large thriving area of Kidney vetch (Anthyllis vulneraria), then we might also have a small thriving colony of Small blue butterflies, as this is their larval food plant.

Sadly, the few plants that manage to survive in the Bay are locked away behind a tall barrier of diagonal wire mesh in a tiny patch of waste ground; the fact they’re inaccessible is probably the only reason they’ve survived Cardiff Council’s ‘spray herbicide on everything’ policy of environmental (mis)management. The mesh also means the plants are very much overlooked and under-appreciated, as well as being difficult to photograph, which is a great shame, as Kidney vetch is a very attractive wildflower.

Butterfly catch up

02 Friday May 2025

Posted by sconzani in insects, spring

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British butterflies, butterfly, Common blue, Common blue butterfly, Dingy Skipper, Large white, Small copper, Spring colour

Just as it’s always magical to see my first butterfly of the year, so is it just as special each time I see the first of each new species. These are the four most recent beauties that have made me smile.

On 25 April my first Large white of 2025 flitted along the footpath next to me, sipped on a Dandelion, then settled on a Bramble leaf long enough for me to photograph.

The next butterfly species to appear for me locally, on 27 April, was this lovely Dingy skipper at an unexpected location – a bonus!

The last few days of hotter than usual temperatures have presumably triggered the early emergence of some species. This stunning male Common blue popped up on 28 April, five days earlier than my previous earliest date.

And, this very morning, eight days earlier than I’ve ever seen one before, I caught a flash of brilliant orange and there sat this gorgeous Small copper, always a treat to see.

Bells of blue

27 Sunday Apr 2025

Posted by sconzani in flowers, spring, wildflowers

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blue flowers, Bluebells, non-native Bluebells, Spring colour, spring wildflowers

I had hoped to get to my local slice of ancient woodland for a walk amongst the native Bluebells this week but it didn’t happen so here are some beautiful non-native but naturalised Bluebells that I’ve encountered in this week’s urban meanders. I hope you all have woodlands near you with Bluebells to enjoy.