Field Notes: Nursery protects rare Lakeland plants

Thirlmere Resilience Partnership Officer Isaac Johnston reports on a community project to nurture montane woodland plants - including a couple of rarities - in the Lake District.

In autumn 2020, the John Muir Trust entered a working relationship with United Utilities and Cumbria Wildlife Trust. Our goal is to create a more resilient catchment for water quality and improve biodiversity in a 40 square kilometre site at Thirlmere – near Helvellyn – in the Lake District.

For nature to thrive, it benefits from having a local provenance. I am working with community volunteers to collect seed and cuttings locally – with consent from Natural England. We then nurture them at home or in our new nursery at the south end of the Thirlmere reservoir.

We established the beds at the West Head Nursery in May 2024, and erected our polytunnel in November. A year on and the nursery is home to a special selection of locally sourced montane woodland plants that will help stabilise the steep slopes around Thirlmere. This will make the area better equipped to withstand the effects of climate change and secure better raw water quality.

Tree and shrub specimens in the nursery include: eared willow, downy willow, tea-leaved willow, bay willow, dark-leaved willow, tea-leaved X dark-leaved willow hybrid, purple willow, aspen, oak, crab apple, Scots pine, alder, downy birch, dogrose, elm, hawthorn, rowan, dwarf birch, juniper and rock whitebeam.

We are also growing wild flowers such as: bitter vetch, marsh marigold, pimpernel, saxifrage, devils bit scabious, water avens, red campion, sea campion, wood cranesbill, meadow cranesbill, alpine cinquefoil and pyramidal bugle.

Our two rarest specimens are rock whitebeam (there’s only one tree at Thirlmere) and pyramidal bugle (one site outside of Scotland). 

The bugle is under pressure from overgrazing by sheep and deer, as well as humans who pick it for private collections. While rock whitebeam also faces grazing pressure and a lack of suitable sites, it grows on more alkaline soil so is rare in the Lakes.

Rock whitebeam also speciate (develop into a new and distinct species) easily. There are lots of whitebeams made up of many species and subspecies. Most are very rare.

We hope to start planting this autumn in an area protected by a newly constructed fence.

Photos: Ailsa Colquhoun / John Muir Trust