Beneath a coppiced hazel on the edge of Wain Wood, a clandestine uprising has begun. Rows of knobbly scales thrust through the soil like skeletal beasts breaking free from their earthy bonds. Some have raised their heads, exposing dirty white flowers suspended from hairy pink stems.
These anaemic inflorescences belong to toothwort (Lathraea squamaria), also known as the corpse flower, supposedly on account of its deathly pallor. Its generic name comes from the Greek lathraios, meaning “hidden”, referring to toothwort’s largely subterranean existence. For most of the year, this holoparasite (a plant that lacks chlorophyll and is reliant on its host) lives beneath the ground, feeding from the roots of trees such as this hazel.
