It’s unusual for a plant to put forth its flowers from September through to April, and then produce seeds May through to August. But that’s what the gorse bush does. Witness …
The seed-pods of gorse: 15th July 2019
During my ramble across Mousehold Heath in mid July, those gorse pods were in magnificent abundance.
Below is a photo I took way back in March 2017. It flowers only when there’s an R in the month (though that does require us to be speaking English!)
Gorse in flower: March 2017
crispina kemp 
What an interesting plant!
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It has been with us since our earliest days. With it we formed hedges to keep out the wild beasts, and later to keep those beasts off our fields. We even used it to harrow those fields. We set our sheep and goats amongst it to nibble the fresh (soft) growth, and used it to thatch out huts if we’d nothing other to hand. And more than that, we shoved it into our ovens, fired it, and used those hot ovens to make our bread.
It’s a member of the pea and bean family. But while the flowers are edible (in small doses) those seeds are not.
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You constantly amaze me with your knowledge!
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I keep it tucked into a little box which I carry around with me, to immediate hand in case of need. 🙂
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LOL!
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🙂
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Super cool plant! It did make me think, “A gorse is a gorse of course of course!”
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Though it could be a gorse of a different colour. Actually, I think you can get purplish ones.
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Very pretty!
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Well, it’s relative, Broom, comes in startling colours. So why not this?
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I did not know Gorse blooms look so beautiful…!
Enid Blyton did not give a hint that this could be so captivating…!
I thank you so much for letting me know about it!
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Pleasure. 🙂
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This sounds like a VERY USEFUL plant. “Of course” 😊 Amazing!
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Throughout our history, yet now it gets a bad press. No sheep to graze it; it gets out of hand.
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What’s new eh? Maybe they need a history lesson about its bountiful uses.
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In areas of conservation they’ve learned to graze the sheep on it.
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Cool 🙂
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I had to run through all 12 months to see when it flowers. LOL. Incredible knowledge and photo! 😀
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Two types of gorse grows in East Anglia: the Common, and the Western. The Common has a more usual flowering season, in later spring. Only the Western Gorse is so perverse, and in East Anglia it grows only to the east. Oddity abounds 🙂
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Interesting! I had to google to see the image, because I only know them as “flowers”. But I didn’t know Western Gorse are pervasive in East Anglia (east England?). In fact, I don’t see them in my part of the world.
I imagine when they are in full bloom, the bushes look like they are on fire! 🙂
PS: I’m glad Google came up with “Lens” which allows me to take photographs and search online to see what they are.
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Yea, I agree, Google does make it easy to identify images. I’ve used it for fungi and butterflies too.
The eastern fringe of East Anglia (from Norwich out to the coast) is mostly sandy heathland, cut through with rich river valleys. Why a form of gorse that’s found in the west of England should have colonised here is a bit of a mystery. Except, perhaps it arrived by ship? Norwich was once an international port (long time ago), as were Yarmouth and Lowestoft. Interestingly, by the time you get as far south as Southwold (which isn’t any great distance) the common gorse takes over.
And yes, heathlands are ablaze with the flowers. Golden. Beautiful… until you have to walk through it. 🙂
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It’s one of those common plants that really light up the landscape often when there’s nothing else to do so 🙂
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Indeed. Yet when I was looking for a photo of gorse in bloom … nothing, just the one I used, dating back to 2017. It seems I have consistently overlooked it.
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