Periwinkle

The periwinkle, Vinca major, isn’t a common plant in areas I fish. In fact it’s quite rare. However it does occur in one south facing grassy bank overlooking a stretch of the Swale where I fish.  Fortunately it’s a stretch that I walk, and fish, regularly.  It’s a beautiful flower, which has resulted in it becoming a common garden flower with little modification from its wild type.  It has even given its name to a colour shade – a pastel shade that both blue and violet.  Hence its appearance is familiar to many. However, its unmistakable in flower as it has large (up to 50mm) showy, solitary, flowers (with 5 notched petals, paler at the base, where they are joined into a corolla) in a vivid and distinctive mauve.  It is all the more outstanding in that few other flowers are flowering in February and March, when this is normally in flower. This year, 2021, its main flowering was hit hard by unseasonable heavy snow and hard frost. The plants suffered and still show signs of the damage.  This led to a few flowers appearing in early May. A good example of how nature is influenced by the environment and responds. This is the stuff that drives evolution.  Its flowering often coincides with the start of the trout season, so it has a certain significance to me. It’s a welcome sign that the spring is here and better weather is arriving.  With so few other flowers around its a welcome sight. It grows as a prostrate climber; with stems trailing amongst the grasses and meadow plants. It has large (50mm), shiny, rather fleshy, dark green, lanceolate, simple leaves traced with paler veins.