Musk Thistle

I love the Musk Thistle, or Nodding Thistle as we knew it as children. At the nature reserve it has been constantly in flower since the autumn, something I've never noticed before. This one was photographed in one of the chalk scrapes we dug three years ago and are now gradually turning green with colonising plants. I normally associate this plant with a host of bees and bumblebees feeding from their flowers. It seems a shame that all their efforts this winter to display extra flowers will not have any insect admirers. This may be the species of thistle that John Clare had in mind when he wrote:

While thistles wear their heavy knobs of bloom
Proud as a warhorse wears its haughty plume.

I wonder if he ever saw them flowering in every week through the winter. He would have thought it very odd...and it surely is!