The distribution of the Oxlip Primula elatior (L.) Hill in Essex
Local wisdom has asserted that the numbers of Oxlip plants have been declining for probably 30
or more years. The work of Rackham (1975) confirmed these views on well-recorded sites in
Cambridgeshire. Whilst the reasons for this decline will be discussed later in this paper, the scale of
the losses has been sufficient for the plant to be listed in the Essex Biodiversity Action Plan. This
plan requires measures to be taken to stabilise and enhance the existing populations. As a first step
towards a recovery programme it was felt essential that the current status of the plant be reviewed.
In addition in 1991 the Joint Nature Conservation Committee launched a programme, in conjunction
with other organisations, to record and document the distribution of nationally scarce species, and
these records will contribute to that programme and complement the survey of Cambridge shire
completed by Preston (1993). Indeed the format and some of the content of the introduction to this
paper owe much to that earlier work of Chris Preston. The last list of Essex sites was that published
in Jermyn's Flora of Essex (1974), and now nearly 30 years old. This then is the background to this
paper - hopefully a first step towards securing a better future for the Oxlip in Essex.
The Oxlip and its habitats in Britain
Early records and the species debate: As we have seen it was John Ray who first recorded the
Oxlip in his Catalogus plantarum circa Cantabrigiam nascentium. His records were at Kingston
and Madingley woods; Primula elatior is still present in the former, but it no longer grows in
Madingley. There is little chance that Ray was in error, since neither Primroses (Primula vulgaris.
Hudson), nor Cowslips (Primula veris. L.) are present on the site, plants that would be needed to
produce the hybrid 'False Oxlip' (Primula x polyantha. Miller.).
Botanists working and living outside the area in which Oxlips occur and who presumably had
never seen Ray's true Oxlip, confused it with the False Oxlip. This hybrid, not uncommon where
the two parents grow in reasonable proximity, is unusual within the Oxlip zone since the primrose
is virtually absent from this area. Sir J.E. Smith stated in Sowerby's English Botany (1799) that 'In
describing the Primrose, we expressed a suspicion that the Oxlip might be a variety of that rather
than the Cowslip, or possibly a hybrid between the two. We are still much inclined to the latter
opinion, and that is has originated from a Primrose impregnated by a Cowslip'. Stacey Gibson
(1842), author of the first Flora of Essex, who was born and lived in Saffron Walden at the very
heart of the county's prime Oxlip woodlands, stated in that 'near Walden (the Oxlip) is much more
abundant than Primula vulgaris, whose place it takes in the woods. As the two species are
comparatively little inter-mixed, the idea of Primula elatior being a hybrid is untenable'. He
further makes the point that on the continent the Oxlip occurs in countries from which the primrose
is absent.
The greatest credit for confirming the status of the Oxlip as a species in England, however, must go
to Henry Doubleday. In a response to a letter in the Phytologist, whose author said of the Oxlip 'we
look in vain for a specific character...', Doubleday (1842) cited his observations at Gt. Bardfield
in Essex: 'They (Oxlips) cannot be hybrids, for the Primrose does not exist in the parish, and these
Oxlips grow by thousands in the meadows and in moist woody places adjoining'. Edward Foster
(1842), the then doyen of Essex botany, reported on a visit to Doubleday's Bardfield sites 'to
gather the true Primula elatior where it was found by Mr Henry Doubleday'. Doubleday also sent
samples of the plants to Charles Darwin who carried out a number of cross - pollination experiments
with the material. Darwin (1869) reported that'... it is manifest that P. elatior is not a hybrid and
that it differs fundamentaly from the Common Oxlip (the Primrose / Cowslip hybrid)'. There the
debate stopped. However, for many years after this the plant was known as the Bardfield Oxlip to
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Essex Naturalist (New Series) 19 (2002)