C. Common Ivy (Hedera helix)

This native evergreen woody climber provides vital nesting and foraging for small birds, egg-laying sites for lepidopterans and food for their caterpillars, and an essential food source for insects in Autumn and Winter. The umbels of flowers, green with yellow anthers, appear in September, followed by black berries. It is not a parasitic plant, so does not normally damage the trees it climbs up.

Infusions are soporific and aid digestion and improve the appetite. They also ease an inflamed bladder. Boiled ivy leaves are a treatment for corns, and ivy ointment soothes burns. If ivy leaves are chopped and steeped in water, and then filtered, the solution may be brushed on a suit to clean the cloth, especially the collar and cuffs. Market stallholders selling suits used to smarten up their appearance by brushing them with this solution. Boiled ivy berries are edible, and were eaten by starving Channel Islanders during the second World War. In folklore, in contrast to the masculine symbolism of the holly, ivy has feminine symbolism, hence the twining of these two plants in wreaths, to symbolise harmony. Ivy is also symbolic of fertility, and ivy garlands were given to newly married couples in the hope that a child would soon arrive as a consequence.