![]() |
![]() |
![]() ![]() |
![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() |
19th July 2020, Lizard Peninsula, Cornwall. | Photo: © Samantha Crosswood |
The many varied Heath plants on the Lizard Penisula. But your Author cannot spot this particular species in the photo. |
19th July 2020, Lizard Peninsula, Cornwall. | Photo: © Samantha Crosswood |
The Lizard Peninsula is renown for the serpentine rocks which give rise to the acid soils there where Cornish Heath thrives - but it grows nowhere else natively in the British Isles. (Of course, there are many cultivars of it for planting in gardens). |
19th July 2020, Lizard Peninsula, Cornwall. | Photo: © Samantha Crosswood |
Cornish Heath (occupying 2/3rds of the frame on the right - those on the left are of differing species of Heath). It has the accolade of being the Floral Emblem of Cornwall and grows mostly on the Lizard Peninsula. It is also a very rare [RRR]. |
19th July 2020, Lizard Peninsula, Cornwall. | Photo: © Samantha Crosswood |
A straggly shrub growing to a height of up to 80cm. |
19th July 2020, Lizard Peninsula, Cornwall. | Photo: © Samantha Crosswood |
The flowers are bell-shaped with 4 rounded lips from which the 8 beetroot-red anthers protrude. The single style is pink with a tiny red discoidal stigma. (The red-flowered plants behind are a differing species of Heath) |
19th July 2020, Lizard Peninsula, Cornwall. | Photo: © Samantha Crosswood |
The leaves are in whorls of 4 or 5, between 5 and 10mm long and needle shaped (linear) with a half-round cross-section.
The stems are 'ribbed' (the leave attachments extend a little way down the stem, until the next leaf-whorls begin. The flowers at the top have not yet opened, and are in pale shades of white to yellow to pink |
Not to be semantically confused with : It grows on the acidic coastal serpentinic rocks on the Lizard Peninsula in Cornwall and almost nowhere else. It is said to be the commonest rare plant in Britain, but it is absent from anywhere else. It is hairless and grows to 80cm high with flowers which are bell-shaped, pink to lilac (sometimes white). The corolla 2.5 to 3.5mm long with a style which protrudes out. The needle shaped leaves in whorls of 4 (to 5) are dense and occur throuout the flower spike, with some below the spike. The 8 anthers also protrude beyond the opening of the corolla in a large circle and are a deep red in colour. |
![]() |
vagans ![]() |
⇐ Global Aspect ⇒ |
Ericaceae ![]() |
![]() Erica (Heaths) |
![]() ![]() |