I live in Colorado. Castles are not a part of my landscape. So of course I was fascinated by the plants that had colonized the walls of Conwy Castle.
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| View of Conwy Castle |
Conwy Castle, on the north coast of Wales, was build between 1283-1287 by King Edward I of England as part of a series of castles to control the Welsh. The English painted it white to enhance its visibility. Castles are very picturesque but I quickly grasped that the photogenic castles of Wales were all built to suppress and control the local people--so they were signs of oppression. Castles elsewhere also represented authority, but often it was local authority and included protection of the population. That was not Edward I's goal when he built a ring of castles around Wales. And Welsh people were not welcome in or close to the castles. I have Welsh ancestors named Carew who emigrated to America probably in the late 1600s. Carew means "from the castle" or "from the fort," giving me a weird link to all this history.
Left to fall apart when castles became obsolete, recent work has rebuilt all the interior stairs so you can walk throughout the castle and take in the views.
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| Inside the walls of Conwy Castle |
Looking west across the bridge over the River Conwy
Little plants, clinging vertically (center)
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Another angle looking out over the River Conwy
The castle has eight big towers; I quickly focused on the plants and did not take panoramic castle views.
Because the plants were very cool. Here they are decorating an old stone stair. I believe the yellow flower is common ragwort, Jacobea vulgaris (daisy family, Asteraceae) but Wales has several weedy daisy-family plants, so there are other possibilities.
Here, a fern grows on a vertical wall. I thought it was a maidenhair fern, Adiantum (maidenhair family Adiantaceae) but I do not have a source to identify British ferns.
Any place that lets seeds catch and where the rain hasn't washed the plants down, had vegetation, especially if I include the mosses (which are plants) and the lichens (which are partly plants).
Here are more ragworts clinging to the sloping rocks
Ivy (Americans would say English ivy, Hedera helix) is sprawling down the wall
There are atleast four different plant species in this photo, but the one in the center is a mallow, common mallow (Malva sylvestris, hibiscus family Malvaceae) called billy buttons or cheeseflower (traditional cheeses were round) for the round brown seed heads on the stalks above the leaves.
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| common mallow on the wall |
Here, the ivy clmbs up the wall
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| ivy |
I saw rosebay willowherb (Epilobium angustifolium, evening primrose family, Onagraceae) a very common colonizing disturbed sites in England and Wales, but it was past flowering, brown with nearly ripe seed pods (standing brown plants in the photo below, looking much like dry grasses). Willowherb plants sprouted in London in great numbers in the years after it was bombed during the Second World War, turning the rubble bright with their purple flowers.
The red in the upper right of the photo is red valerian (Centranthus ruber, honeysuckle family, Caprifoliaceae). Introduced from southern Europe in the 16th century, it spread rapidly, growing on old walls, quarries, and other stony places. Obviously including castles.
Way up high, hard to distinguish, is a purple-flowered plant of butterfly bush (Buddleja davidii, figwort family, Scrophulaceae) introduced from Asia as an ornamental in the 1890s and now widespread and invasive.
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| Rosebay willowherb, red valerian, butterfly bush and more |
Butterfly bush growing between rock wall and pavement, central Wales.
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| butterfly bush, Buddleja davidii |
There were a half dozen different plants with small leaves growing out of the rocks--see, for example the lower part of the photo with rosebay willowherb (2nd above)-- but I don't know my British plants well enough to identify them.
I could not get near enough to identify the shrubs that are at the base of the walls. The green line is a railing to keep the tourists safe; there is a ditch with vertical sides that drops down 20' between the viewer and the castle. It is concealed in my photo.
These are mountain-side like places, it is just that humans built them. The plants I saw are not mountain specialists but rather common weedy species, treating this old stonework as a old pavement or a stone fence. Plants will have arrived almost immediately after the castle was built, but during the time that this was an important military installation, crews periodically removed the plants. Today Cadw, the trust that manages the castle, not doubt removes plants for safety and because most people don't come for the plants but expect to see a stony fortress.
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| View of Castell Conwy |
Castell Conwy. I tried to learn Welsh during my visit. The spelling-pronunciation differences from English are daunting so I was pleased to find the word for castle in Welsh is castell, easy to remember. The order is reversed from English, so Castell Conwy. Ah, but its not so simple! The double l in Welsh is not pronounced like an l at all, but rather like sh. So, phonetically for me "Castesh Conwy". Beware the differences between English and Welsh pronunciation of the same letters! (I am still studying Welsh (through DuoLingo); I find it a delight, logical and coherent but different from English.)
Interesting plants can be found even in odd places like medieval castles. And here...this is the view into the well within Conwy Castle. Lots of interesting plants growing there...alas, too far away to see well. Is that ivy, way down below?
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| well inside Conwy Castle |
Note the plants wherever you are.
References
Reader's Digest. 1981. Wildflowers of Britain. Readers Digest Publishing, New York.
Wikipedia and miscellaneous websites for checking plant names and families to be sure they are current.
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