Wakefield Museums and Castles

So, at the start of a new year, we thought that you might be interested in some 'flowering figures'.

The Medieval Herb Garden at Pontefract Castle started in 2018. We began with 44 varieties of plants.

By the end of 2025 it had over 160 different varieties. There was a grand total a total of over 5,500 individual medieval plants.

The lowest number of varieties in flower was 8 on 27 January 2025. The highest number of varieties in flower was 96 on 23 June 2025.

The top 10 longest flowering varieties for 2025 were:

• Rosemary (46 weeks in flower)

• Green feverfew (43 weeks)

• Ragwort (39 weeks)

• Marigold (38 weeks)

• Green alkanet (37 weeks)

• Good King Henry (37 weeks)

• Catmint (36 weeks)

• Rue (35 weeks)

• Thrift (34 weeks)

• Borage (34 weeks)

The 10 shortest flowering varieties for 2025 were:

• Common agrimony (1 week)

• Lesser celandine (2 weeks)

• Salsify (3 weeks)

• Crab apple (3 weeks)

• Saffron (3 weeks)

• Meadowsweet (4 weeks)

• Hedge woundwort (4 weeks)

• Golden feverfew (5 weeks)

• Dropwort (5 weeks)

• Pasque flower (5 weeks)

Some of these figures are slightly skewed. This is due to the actual number of individual plants that we have in each variety. For example, we had over 40 ragworts and borages flowering throughout the year. Conversely, we have only five green feverfews and just two green alkanets.

As we are at the start of a new year, the plant of the week is one of the newer additions to the flora of the castle. It is planted by the sally port. It is a tree which should outlast every other plant and tree on site. It has the capacity to live for thousands of years!

Yew is native to Western, Central and Southern Europe. It is also native to Northwest Africa, Northern Iran and Southwest Asia. The yew is a long-lived, dioecious (see below), toxic, evergreen, conifer tree. It will grow in full sun to partial shade in any well-drained soil.

Yews can live for thousands of years. They always have a gnarled, twisted trunk. The trunk is between 6.5 to 13 ft (2 to 4 m) in diameter. It has a thin, scaly, reddish-brown bark (which comes off in small flakes). The huge trunks hollow out with age. They can become so hollow to the extent that carriages have been driven through the middle of them.

Yew roots are extensive, fibrous and extremely strong. They form a dense network that can fill hollow trunks with internal, supportive stems as the tree ages. They also having surface roots that interlace and spread widely. This both gives young bare-root trees stability against wind and supports the ancient, hollow trees.

The leaves are flat, waxy and dark green. They are ½ to 1½ inches (1 to 4 cm) long and very narrow (2 to 3 mm). The leaves are are arranged spirally on the stem. The leaf bases are twisted to align the leaves in two flat rows on either side of the stem. This is apart from on erect, leading shoots where the spiral arrangement is more obvious. New trees will take root where the parent tree branches touch the ground.

Yews are mostly 'dioecious'. This means the male and female cones grow on separate trees. Occasionally yew trees can be monoecious (hermaphrodite), or change sex with time.

Yew flowers are not true flowers. Instead, they are clusters of stamens. The male ‘flowers’ appear in February to March. They start as 'Brussels sprout-like' growths which turn into pale yellow sacs of small spheres. These then open to drop their anthers and release pollen. The female ‘flower’ is a single ovule covered in scale-like bracts.

Male yews are highly allergenic. They bloom and releasing enormous amounts of pollen in the spring. They have an Ogren Plant Allergy Scale (OPALS) rating of 10 out of 10. Yew pollen does not contain sufficient taxine alkaloids to cause poisoning. Female yews have an OPALS rating of 1, the lowest possible. They trap pollen, but don't produce any of their own.

The fruit is only produced on female yew trees. Each seed cone contains a single seed, which is 4 to 7 mm long. It is surrounded by a fleshy scale. This develops into a soft, bright red berry-like aril. The small stone in the middle is toxic and must not be chewed or swallowed. The aril is 8 to 15 mm long and wide and is open at the end. The arils mature 6 to 9 months after pollination. The arils are gelatinous, even slimy. They are very sweet, similar in taste to a lychee.

Only the berry pulp (aril) can be eaten. It can be made into a jam. The poisonous seeds must be removed first.

Yew wood shavings can give an orange and rust-coloured dye. Caution is necessary during its production as it is poisonous.

Yew is a closed-pore softwood. This makes it one of the hardest of the softwoods. Despite this, it has great elasticity, making it ideal for crafting bows and lutes. Bowls, tankards, barrel hoops, tool handles, combs, relic boxes and dowsing rods were also made from yew wood. Yew staffs were carried by royalty and judges.

In the Middle Ages, yew was in high demand due to its use for making longbows. The species was felled to near extinction in much of Europe. The majority of the world’s ancient yews are in the British Isles. Of these, over 80% are in churchyards. 

Yews can live for thousands of years and regenerate from within. This has led to associations with eternal life, resurrection and the soul's journey. Their presence in graveyards is thought to guard the dead. Yew branches were carried at funerals, symbolising transition and protection for souls.

The Druids believed that wands of yew would banish evil spirits. It was one of their nine sacred trees, used for starting Beltane fires. 

In Irish mythology the yew was known as the 'Tree of Ross', ‘the offspring of the tree that is in Paradise’.

In Spain, yew branches were placed on balconies to ward off lightning.

One of the world's oldest surviving wooden artifacts is the Clacton Spear. It is a yew spear head which is around 400,000 years old. It was found in 1911 at Clacton-on-Sea.

The yew tree genome has about 50,000 genes. Humans have less than 30,000.

Rabbits and deer have a level of immunity to the poisonous alkaloids contained in yew.

The tree’s toxicity protects it against many insects. The yew mite causes significant bud mortality. The seedlings can be killed by fungi.

The arils are eaten by hawfinches, greenfinches, and great tits. They disperse the hard seeds undamaged in their droppings.

As most parts of the tree are toxic, it did not have any regular medicinal use.

However, one record states: "In homoeopathy a tincture of the young shoots and also of the berries is used in a variety of diseases: cystitis, eruptions, headache and neuralgia, affections of the heart and kidneys, dimness of vision, and gout and rheumatism."

*As always, this isn't to be considered medical advice today. Please don't use any plants mentioned in these blogs as medicine without advice from a doctor.