In late February and throughout March daffodils can be seen at the side of the road throughout Britain. By far the majority of these are various escaped garden varieties and not the native daffodil. As a rough indication the wild flower is smaller than most garden varieties excepting the small rockery versions and varieties like February Gold which don't look anything like the wild species. The outer sepals are paler than the "trumpet" in the wild native daffodil.

The genuine wild daffodil isn't common but where it does grow it will often occur in thousands. There are fields with thousands in near Ross on Wye and along the banks of one river in the Lake District they grow in thousands stretching for a mile or so. Wordsworth's Lake district cottage is so touristy now that I doubt any of those growing there are the originals he saw.

Daffodils are common and there is little doubt that cultivated daffodils have been recorded for Narcissus pseudonarcissus making the plant seem much commoner than it really is. It is not common in Scotland or Ireland.

Coed Cilygroeslwyd, North Wales 17th March 2005

Added on 17th March 2005, updated January 13th 2011, updated 15th June 2014