A PROCESS such as climate change is so massive that sometimes we forget its potential effect on small, familiar aspects of our lives, on parts of nature that perhaps we take for granted. Thus, if we draw our eyes down from the huge and changeable skies to the dim-lit floors of ancient woods in spring, doubtless we’d be glad to see a carpet of bluebells.

But, according to the latest scientific research, rising temperatures may affect when bluebells come into leaf and flower, making them miss their optimum time to develop. They might find life a bit of a struggle and even if – nature being nature – they suspected that already, things might take a turn for the worse if they can’t keep up with the changes.

Other species that might suffer include garlic mustard, sycamore, larch and, possibly, lesser celandine. Evidence for such a sad scenario comes from a study by the University of Edinburgh’s School of Biological Sciences, using 200,000 records of public sightings over 16 years from the Woodland Trust’s Nature Calendar project.

Unsurprisingly, the yrust has flagged up the threat to such an “iconic” species, one indeed that is sometimes banned from UK-wide favourite flower polls because it so frequently comes top. Readers may recall that its “silent eloquence” filled Anne Bronte’s “softened heart with bliss”.

We should stress that the Scottish bluebell, as such, is a different beastie – our name for the harebell, family Campanulaceae, sometimes called blawort, witch’s bell or fairy’s thimbles, as distinct from the bluebell’s Asparagaceae family, where it is sometimes known as wood bell, fairy flower and bell bottle. But let us not split harebells here. We love all bluebells – they’re all Jock Tamson’s flora – and will be rooting for them in the struggle to deal with climate change. Other species, such as the silver birch, alder, beech, ash, wood anemone, cuckooflower and cocks-foot, seem to be adapting fine, and it is to be hoped perhaps that the bluebell is just being a little slow to grasp the nettle.