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Intro.
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Post 14
The steps on the left lead up to Common Road and carry the Bentley Priory Circular Walk. Across the road can be seen a half timbered house, Glenthorne Lodge. This was one of the old gatehouses to the Bentley Priory estate and the impressive iron gates to the left of the house remain from that time.
Our route continues straight ahead. If you are here in early spring (January through April) look out for the pretty yellow flowers of lesser celandine Ficaria verna on both sides of the path just beyond post 14 (see image below). This pretty member of the buttercup family appears very early in the year, before the woodland trees have put out their leaves. Once the trees come into leaf in April/May, there is very little light for the celandines to use and the plant abandons its leaves, transferring all the nutrients down into corms below the ground, ready to fuel rapid growth next spring.
Image by Natural England / Allan Drewitt, Creative Commmons licence
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