Photographing wildflowers will be one of the themes for the spring and summer series on the Southwell Trail and my first challenge was identifying this small yellow flower, which I believe to be a lesser celandine.
Whilst researching the identity of the flower I came across the Woodland Trust's description which included this verse from William Wordsworth's, 'To the Small Celandine':
Pansies, lilies, kingcups, daisies,
Let them live upon their praises;
Long as there's a sun that sets,
Primroses will have their glory;
Long as there are violets,
They will have a place in story:
There's a flower that shall be mine,
'Tis the little Celandine.
Apparently, Wordworth was very fond of the Celandine and it was the subject of two other poems: 'To the Same Flower' and 'The Small Celandine'.
I found the first verse of 'The Small Celandine' very apt given the cold snowy conditions that greeted the start of spring:
There is a flower, the lesser Celandine,
That shrinks, like many more, from the cold and rain;
And, the first moment that the sun may shine,
Bright as the sun himself, 'tis out again!
Apart from the highlight of the lesser Celandine there wasn't too much spring to show in this first selection of the season, there was even a bit of snow lingering in sheltered spots, and the trees were still leafless. I did, however, spot some blackthorn buds and there was at least some colour from a flowering laburnum:
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