It’s peak bluebell as nation bursts into full bloom
◆ Ilona Amos offers seasonal appreciation for one of Scotland’s favourite native wild flower species
If you go down to the woods today you can be sure of a big surprise... Teddy bears may not be guaranteed but a grand spectacle certainly awaits.
Now that spring has fully sprung, forests all over the country are illuminated with a rich violet glow and heady scent as one of the nation’s favourite native wild flower species bursts into bloom.
Bluebells can be found in woodlands across the nation, but conservationists say the coming week or so is the optimum time to see them in their full glory – they are calling it “peak bluebell”.
Since more than half the world’s total population of bluebells grow in the UK, it is considered the unofficial national flower by many.
Its delicate beauty has been an inspiration to influential poets and writers, including Oscar Wilde, Emily and Anne Brontë, Gerard Manley Hopkins, and Percy Bysshe Shelley.
What’s more, the presence of the plants in a woodland is a sure sign that the forest is an ancient one – with roots stretching as far back as 1600, maybe earlier.
Here we have listed some of the best Scottish locations where you can expect to find impressive showings, selected by conservation charity Woodland Trust Scotland.
Its top five sites are: Glen Finglas, near Callander in the Trossachs; Keil’s Den, near Leven in Fife; Dunollie, Oban;
Aldouran Glen, by Stranraer, and Crinan in Argyll.
Other great places are Fairy Glen, Fortrose; Urquhart Bay, Loch Ness and Balmacaan Wood, Inverness, all in the Highlands; Glasdrum Wood, Oban, Argyll; Carron Glen, Denny, Falkirk; Dalkeith Country Park, Midlothian; Binn Wood, near Glenfarg, and Loch of the Lowes, Blairgowrie, both Perth and Kinross; House of Dun, Brechin, Angus; Carstramon Wood, Gatehouse-of-fleet, Dumfries and Galloway; Brodick, Isle of Arran, and Corsehillmuir Wood, near Kilwinning, both North Ayrshire; Pepper Wood at Kirkliston, near Edinburgh; Cathkin Braes Country Park, East Kilbride; Baron’s Haugh, Motherwell, and Cumbernauld Glen, Cumbernauld, both North Lanarkshire.
So get yourselves off down to the woods to enjoy the annual bluebell extravaganza. Disguise is optional.
But please remember if you
We ask everyone enjoying bluebells to keep to existing paths and leave them to do their glorious thing
are having a picnic – with or without teddy bears – please don’t lay your blanket on the bluebells.
Also try to avoid stamping on the blooms when you’re capturing that all-important selfie, and deter pets from lolloping amongst them.
The plants are easily damaged and can take up to seven years to recover.
“There really is nothing to beat a walk in a bluebell wood, and we love welcoming people to our sites at this time of year,” says George Anderson of Woodland Trust Scotland .
“But it would be a pity if there is less of a display in future because people have been careless.
“The plants must pack a lot of work into a very short few weeks and it can be catastrophic for them to be crushed or trampled now.
“Between emerging in spring and the trees above
coming into full leaf that shades them, bluebells must get enough energy from the sun to sustain them throughout the year.
“They are also racing to make the most of their time in the sun before other plants, such as bracken, overtake them.
“In the same short window, they must blossom and reproduce too.
“So we ask everyone enjoying bluebells to keep to existing paths and leave them to do their glorious thing undisturbed.
“You can get great photos staying on the path.”