The Cuckoo’s Shoe

Yesterday I posted about the Cuckoo. Today, naturally, it is the Cuckoo’s Shoe — not, alas, footwear for birds, but yet another whimsical provincial name, this time for the Dog Violet¹“The English Dialect Dictionary, Being the Complete Vocabulary of All Dialect Words Still in Use, or Known to Have Been in Use during the Last Two Hundred Years; Founded on the Publications of the English Dialect Society and on a Large Amount of Material Never before Printed”. In six volumes edited by Joseph Wright, 1898. Volume I. Internet Archive, 2014, https://archive.org/details/englishdialectdi01wriguoft. Accessed 10 Apr. 2021.. A harmless enough little flower, though my encounter this morning has sent me spiralling into yet more botanical trivia.

The woodland floor is having its usual spring flirtation with the colour blue. Bluebells are rehearsing their big show but have not yet stolen the limelight. Meanwhile, the Dog Violet gets on with the business of being very small and very blue. Bees, hopelessly taken in by the colour, seem to like them.

Belonging to the genus Violaceae — which sounds more dramatic than it deserves — violets thrive in alkaline soil, shaded banks, and the sort of neglected corners that gardeners call “natural.” They are a morally dubious group of plants, inclined to hybridise at the drop of a hat. I believe this one is the Common Dog Violet, the most widespread and tediously dependable member of the family. It lacks any scent, hence the ‘dog’ label, as though ‘dog’ were a term of botanical insult. Apparently, some Fritillary butterflies approve²Mabey, Richard. “Flora Britannica”. Reed International Books Ltd. 1996. ISBN 1 85619 377 2..

A 1930s newspaper, which started this digression, described the Dog Violet as producing millions of utterly pointless flowers in Spring³Lewisham Borough News – Tuesday 20 April 1937. Not a single one, it said, is much good at making seed. The plant, it seems, is performing for its own amusement. Later in Summer, the real work begins — it quietly produces secret flowers that never open, never attempt to charm bees, and yet manage to produce all the seeds.

This was breathlessly described as “astonishing” and “miraculous.” Darwin, never one for overstatement, suggested it might be an act of economy. Yes, nothing says thrift like expending vast energy on sterile flowers while quietly stashing your real efforts in a closed bud.

Modern science, always on hand to suck the mystery out of things, explains it neatly. The violet’s early spring showpieces are “chasmogamous” — open, pollinator-dependent, inefficient. They exist mainly to wave at passing insects in the hope of genetic variation. Summer brings “cleistogamous” flowers — closed, dull, entirely self-sufficient.

This two-pronged reproductive strategy — half public theatre, half bureaucratic efficiency — is apparently not uncommon. But for the Dog Violet, this split personality is how it ensures survival. A flamboyant failure followed by a quiet success.

And that, dear reader, is how I lost an afternoon.

• 1
  “The English Dialect Dictionary, Being the Complete Vocabulary of All Dialect Words Still in Use, or Known to Have Been in Use during the Last Two Hundred Years; Founded on the Publications of the English Dialect Society and on a Large Amount of Material Never before Printed”. In six volumes edited by Joseph Wright, 1898. Volume I. Internet Archive, 2014, https://archive.org/details/englishdialectdi01wriguoft. Accessed 10 Apr. 2021.
• 2
  Mabey, Richard. “Flora Britannica”. Reed International Books Ltd. 1996. ISBN 1 85619 377 2.
• 3
  Lewisham Borough News – Tuesday 20 April 1937