The first crocus is out (purple in my garden) and the snowdrops have lasted a long time this year probably because just as they wanted to come out it got a bit colder again. Still they have made a pleasant show next to my mother’s sick bed. The daffodils are growing tall and the bushes are starting to bud. Soon leaves will appear to shade the frog spawn in the pond.
I am reminded of The Green Inheritance, a book I read in 1983, where Dr Huxley pointed out that the periwinkle, a common enough small hedgerow flower, was shown to posses two alkaloids that slowed the spread or leukemia. It was a graphic description of how married we are to nature and how exotic, chemical compounds in flowers can help us understand ourselves. And I thought then of the flowers no one catalogued as they tore down the rain forests and the loss of those chemical compounds and the potential cures they could give to diseases the human race has yet to have. Although genoming viruses and germs will provide us with great insights in the future, I still think this act was one of immense ignorance.
Besides which look at all the plants we missed knowing.