Berkshire: Windsor Great Park

7 May 2013                                                OS 175: Reading & Windsor

Length: half day.

We visited two sites - Savill Gardens for its naturalised daffodils, and Cranborne Chase and the open park for its veteran trees.  It is possible to walk between the two, although we drove separately to each, saving repetition of the walk back.

          The car park at Savill Gardens is signed from the main roads at SU977706.  There is an entrance fee, but the car park is free for the first 90 minutes.  We found we could walk round it in an hour.  In front of the Savill Building where the entrance and shop stand is a welcoming "Sedum roof" that at this time was carpeted with flowering stems of meadow saxifrage Saxifraga granulata.

Meadow saxifrage amongst small Sedum leaves

After entry we descended the grass slope towards the lake.  On this slope a group of daffodils with 1-3 flowers per stem, of medium size, appeared to be the cultivar 'Sweetness' (see picture). 

'Sweetness' daffodil

 By the bridge over the lake we visited a bank with cuckoo-flowers Cardamine pratensis being visited at the same time by orange-tip butterflies, while dark alder flies emerged from the lake that had been the home of their larvae.  Here among field woodrush Luzula campestris and the leaves of common spotted orchid Dactylorrhiza fuchsii, there were plants of a pale purple form of wood anemone Anemone nemorosa, which can occur naturally, but may have been selected for this horticultural situation.  There were also many well-naturalised specimens of the miniature species Narcissus bulbocodium with its distinctive megaphone-shaped flowers, also known as the "hoop-petticoat daffodil".  These were scattered all across this bank and we were to find them similarly naturalised in many other grasslands in the gardens, particularly in the area beyond the lake called The Glades.  It appears that they seed and germinate readily, although native to SW Europe.  The Glades consist of a large meadow on both sides of a small stream where N. bulbocodium is rife, along with a few specimens of another miniature Narcissus minor.  It was pleasing to see a formal garden like this allow these species to spread and acclimatise, looking as though they were in their natural meadow habitat instead of a garden-bed, and this as a matter of policy.

 

Pale purple form of wood anemone

Narcissus bulbocodium

 In the lake below flowered bogbean Menyanthese trifoliata and marsh marigold Caltha palustris, which may have been native to these waters.

Bogbean in the lake

In The Glades the N. bulbocodium was accompanied by bluebell Hyacinthoides non-scripta, cowslip Primula veris, and fritillaries Fritillaria meleagris, a good many the white form that hints that these, like the daffodils, were introduced, as the white form constitutes only a very small percentage of "native" or at least long-established populations.  Other introductions in this meadow are Erythronium revolutum, a lily with marbled leaves, and Asian skunk-cabbage Lysichiton camtschatcensis in the brook.  St Georges Mushroom Calocybe gambosa also grew here.

 

Narcissus bulbocodium in The Glades with a couple of Narcissus minor

Fritillaries by the brook in The Glades

Erythonium revolutum

Asian skunk-cabbage

The other species daffodil long-naturalised in the Gardens is the cyclamen daffodil Narcissus cyclamineus, so named for its swept-back petals.  There is a large plot of this beyond the Glades as you approach the Spring Garden.  Unfortunately this plant had flowered much earlier and it took a diligent search to find one last fading bloom to photograph.

Narcissus cyclameneus

We completed the tour of the garden past the Queen Elizabeth Temperate House and back to the river and its lakes.  Striking plants included the following.

Rhododendrons augustinii cv 'Electra' (upper)

& 'Baden Baden' hybrid 'Essex Scarlet' x forrestii 'Repens' (lower)

Lily of the valley

Acer palmatum 'Dissectum'

'Salome' daffodil with pink trumpet

'Coleman Hybrid' daffodil

'Baby Moon' daffodil

'Toto' daffodil

 

Inside the warm Temperate House mossy clubmoss Selaginella kraussiana was spreading like a weed, although we did not see it escaped, as it does occasionally in the south-west.

Mossy Clubmoss inside the Temperate House

By the stream American skunk-cabbage Lysichiton americanus is well naturalised, and we saw one small patch of blinks Montia fontana, quite possibly native.

American skunk-cabbage

As we returned to the entrance we noticed a fenced grass plot where another species daffodil was being naturalised, this time the multi-flowered creamy Narcissus triandrus from the Iberian peninsula.

 

Narcissus triandrus

We then drove to the car-park on the A332 at SU948727, opposite a pink lodge called Cranbourne Gate.  This provides access to a small part of the old woodland of Cranbourne Chase.  Immediately by the entrance to the car-park is one venerable pollard oak Quercus robur, over 700 metres girth, which is split but apparently in good condition.

 

 

There are similar pollard oaks all along this part of the A332, easily seen from a car.

Old pollard oak by A332

Also near the entrance was shining cranesbill Geranium lucidum, but the ground flora in this area is generally poor with thin acid soils and improved grassland.

 

Shining cranesbill

To the south more old oaks in various states of disrepair were visible in cow pasture.

In the semi-open woodland west of the car-park roamed cattle that looked very like the Chillingham breed, closest to the original wild cattle.  We also saw roe deer.

 

Chillingham? bull, Cranbourne Chase

We followed a sandy riding track (there seem to be no footpaths) through the woodland, past a fine display of bluebells.

Cranbourne Chase

Most of the veteran trees here are oak, but we did see the odd beech Fagus sylvatica, hosting the common willow bracket Phellinus igniarius.

 

Old beech, Cranbourne Chase

Willow brackets on old beech

Another old oak, Cranbourne Chase

While the veterans are oak and beech, the younger growth trees are mainly sycamore Acer pseudoplatanus with hawthorn Crataegus monogyna scrub, while ash seedlings Fraxinus excelsior dominate the ground layer, showing a very different wood developing.  There were also some tall old apple trees, but Malus domestica, not the true crab apple.

Apple blossom

The riding track bent back round to the road opposite Rangers Gate.  We crossed the A332 here and found by the gate some clumps of early scurvy-grass Cochlearia danica, a sign of road-salting.  By the lodge was another impressive old oak.

Early scurvy-grass, Rangers Gate

Old oak by Lodge, Rangers Gate

We entered the main part of Windsor Great Park, an odd artificial landscape of straight hedgerows, wide grass rides with vistas and statues, improved grassland and intensively farmed fields, where the vegetation is very low in diversity, a landscape for riding and hunting rather than walking.  The main flowers in the low grass were dandelions Taraxacum officinale agg and the introduced slender speedwell Veronica filiformis.

 

Vista towards Windsor Castle along Queen Anne's Ride

We took the path to Queen Anne's Ride and up there to The Village, where grotesque lime-trees Tilia x europaea, much lopped and pruned against their natural growth, were festooned with large clumps of mistletoe Viscum album.  They stand near the Millstone statue commemorating the planting of 1000 trees along this ride in 1992, replacing veterans that were taken down because they looked decrepit, not recognising they were invaluable for invertebrates and fungi in that state, and even have a certain Gothic scenic value.

Mistletoe limes by The Village and the Millstone

We went east from this spot towards the 1829 copper statue of George III on Snow Hill.  We passed an excellent large veteran oak which was not far under 10 metres in girth.  The emergence holes in some of the dead wood showed that it was being well used by beetles.

Ancient oak with girth of nearly 10 metres

Bark of the veteran oak

This route also passed some old hornbeams Carpinus betulus and some fragments of wood stained blue by the Green Elfcup fungus.  There was another long vista to Windsor Castle from the top by the statue.  We walked south from here and circled around the other side of The Village, sometimes with ring-necked parakeets flying over with their harsh cries, and occasional views of brown hare, pheasant and red-legged partridge.  From here it is just a short walk back to Cranbourne Gate.