As a Scot living in Yorkshire, there are few things more likely to bring me cheer than a freebie. Thus I was delighted to open my December issue of Yorkshire Life magazine and find a free calendar inside. The good folks at Visit North Yorkshire had cobbled together a selection of rousing images of the county I call home: purple heather on the North York moors; pink cherry blossoms and daffodils in Harrogate; and, to kick off the year in grand style, the grassy banks of Mount Grace Priory carpeted in snowdrops.
My first plucky snowdrops poked their noses through the ground on January 16 (I know because I rushed out excitedly to take a snap). All around the weeping ash, down the side of the lane and among the big trees behind the house, these intrepid revivalists fought their way to freedom. It was about four more weeks before they hit full bloom but, when they did, boy, did they give the fellas at Mount Grace a run for their money.
January can feel like the longest and dreariest of months; there’s certainly precious little happening in most of our gardens, and the emergence of those first snowdrops signals, if not necessarily the end of winter, certainly the beginning of the end. There is something uplifting about the snowdrop. Partly, it’s the purity of it, fresh green and bright white against all that beastly mud and oomska; partly, it’s the awe one feels that something so small and delicate can force its way up through six inches of Yorkshire permafrost.
Last year, thanks to my newly acquired scything skills and generally spending a lot more time clodhopping about the garden, the nettles, thistles and tangled grasses in the various wooded bits got a bashing for the first time in at least 30 years — and my snowdrops loved it. What were a few shattered clumps have in some spots merged to form huge snowy drifts, tens of thousands of little white hoods carpeting swaths of ground. But still, there are plenty of areas where there are none — spots where I could see and enjoy them more frequently from the house — so I did a little transplanting.
Snowdrops thrive in the damp and dappled shade of deciduous wooded areas or under deciduous shrubs. Loving nothing better than pushing their way through the leaf litter of oak, beech and hazel, they get their business done early so that by the time the trees and shrubs are springing back to life they are not in competition for precious moisture.
They will spread naturally by setting their seeds, and clumps will, where space allows, create new bulbs, which means free flowers for really very little effort (ergo excellent). To keep your plants healthy and hearty, and to encourage and enable their spread, you need to split and lift your clumps — a task that requires little more than a bucket or trug and a spade. Take a decent-sized clump, a foot or so across; lift it and split it into three or four smaller clumps, trying to keep the soil with them. Put one back where it came from and fill in the hole with a bit of soil or compost; then take your two or three new clumps and replant them elsewhere, ideally giving them at least a foot in diameter of room around them to allow their ongoing spread. It’s a very simple process indeed.
The best time to do this is while they’re still in flower or shortly after, which in the chillier north is likely to be from the end of February until about now — mid March (don’t delay). This leaves time for the bulbs to be fed by their leaves before they die back, meaning good blooming next year. Ideally, you do this every year, which is fine at first, but less so when you’ve been so good at snowdrop cultivation you have acres of them.
Snowdrops, or Galanthus nivalis, were first introduced to Britain in the Middle Ages, apparently by monks travelling back from southern Europe. They’ve long been associated with monasteries and churchyards, and were known as Candlemas bells, flowering in time for Candlemas, the feast of the purification of the Virgin Mary, traditionally the 40th day of Christmas.
While definitely the most common, the snowdrop is not the only winter woodlander that thrives in the British garden. Winter aconites, bright yellow with a little green ruff, used to pop up in my garden, a colourful pal for the snowdrop, but it seems very few have survived my pigs’ rooting. The pigs lift snowdrop bulbs but they don’t appear to eat them, which surprises me greatly — the only other things they don’t seem to eat are lettuce and red peppers.
I also had a scattering of wild primroses and wood anemone but we’ll need to wait a few weeks to see how they have fared. I am fairly sure I’ll need to bolster their numbers with new bulbs, which I’ll get planted before the end of April, but if I get this fab four going strong I’ll have colour and interest in the woodland right through until the arrival of the fruit blossoms.
Reducing our large expanses of lawn and replanting with shrubs and trees is a great way to help nature. In these new habitats, woodland plants such as cyclamen, cranesbills, oxlip, red campion and various violets (all apparently easy to grow) thrive, bringing colour and interest throughout the year, in a charming and very easy-going habit.
Another woodlander that flourishes in my corner of North Yorks is ransom, or wild garlic. There are various hillsides near me where you can’t move for the stuff. Its delicate white flowers are a great early food for bees and butterflies, pigs love the bulbs, but most importantly, as any good hipster will tell you, its leaves are delicious to eat. Great in soups, stews and pestos, the odd bagful makes its way to my table most seasons, and my brilliant neighbours at Rind make a delicious seasonal pizza with it. Here’s to the woodlanders, the messengers of spring, to new beginnings and to everyone whiffing of garlic.
‘To The First Snowdrop’ by Constance Naden, from ‘Songs and Sonnets of Springtime’, first published 1881
Fair, sunny-hearted child of many tears!
Thou, while my mother Earth forsaken slept,
Didst gather to thyself pure hopes, that crept
Through stormy dreams; and now the sun appears,
White buds reflect each rare faint smile, that cheers
The home where thine unshapen germ was kept,
Safe in deep midnight, while the heavens wept,
Or hung the shuddering trees with frosty spears.
Now springs to life and light each buried joy,
With broken music and with tearful glow,
With drooping blossoms, winter-pale and coy;
For Love shall soon fulfil her long desire —
Her face and breast are memories of snow,
Her heart, like thine, is lit with vestal fire.
Patrick Grant is the founder of Community Clothing, a judge on BBC television’s “The Great British Sewing Bee” and author of “Less” (HarperCollins)
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