Dog Rose (Rosa Canina)

Dog or Wild Rose at in the car park hedgerow at Barnes Wetland Centre.

  

This flowering plant is also known as the Wild Rose and is famously the symbol of England. Dog Rose is the most common of the wild roses and is in flower now until about the end of July. In late August the plant bares its fruit the rosehip that has many uses as wild food and medicine. In Roger Phillips Wild Food it’s claimed that pound for pound rosehip contains twenty times as much vitamin c as an orange. The fruit should not be picked until after the first frost and it is not really worth picking after the end of October. You should see these in hedgerows or on scrubland in London. Most of the flowers I’ve seen about are pale pink or white but they maybe seen in deep pink. If picking the fruit to make one of the many recipe’s there are about then watch out for the hooked thorns.