South Gower Cliffs - Gower - page 88

FIG 46 . Yellow whitlowgrass, the 'county flower' of Glamorgan, near Overton. (Harold Grenfell)
The plant was not discovered in Gower until the late eighteenth century. Its comparatively late dis-
covery is probably due to its extremely early flowering season, inaccessible habitat and restriction to one
small area in a little-visited part of the country. It was first reported by William Turton in 1803 'growing
wild abundantly on walls and rocks around Pennard Castle', but was actually discovered by John Lucas
in 1795 'near Worm's Head'. Dillwyn's Contributions Towards a History of Swansea , published in 1840,
includes the following account of yellow whitlowgrass in 'An alphabetical account of the rarer flowering
plants and ferns which have been found within twenty miles of Swansea':
Draba aizoides was first noticed on the walls of Pennard Castle, by the late Mr. Lucas, of
Stouthall, who communicated his discovery to Dr. Coyte, of Ipswich, and it was the Doctor's fault,
as he admitted to me, that the merit of this interesting discovery was withheld from Mr. Lucas.
The plant was afterwards shown by Mr. Lucas to Dr. Turton, and the latter sent the specimen to
Sowerby which has been figured in English Botany. It grows also on most of the higher cliffs, and
in many inaccessible places along the coast from Pennard to Wormshead.
While correct details of the distribution of yellow whitlowgrass in Gower were given by Dillwyn and to
a lesser extent by John Gutch the following year, later botanists often knew only of the Pennard Castle
locality (Fig. 47). Although the castle is constructed of Old Red Sandstone the whitlowgrass grows in
crevices in the lime-rich mortar. For many years this was seen as the classic location and the early flor-
as, following the descriptions of Turton and Gutch, gave its locality as 'Pennard Castle and rocks near'
as though this was its sole location, which is simply not true. Such misinformation did protect the plant,
however, as it resulted in collectors missing some of the best sites. Edwin Lees, for example, an astute
amateur botanist from Worcester, wrote in The Botanical Looker-Out in 1842: