Primrose - the name means 'first rose' - is a small, favourite perennial. The pale yellow flowers are solitary on long fragile stalks. The leaves are bright green, crinkled, and narrowed gradually at the base without a definite stalk.
In most of Europe it is a woodland plant, but the damp air of Ireland lets it grow in pastures and on sand dunes as well as in shady banks.
It is especially fine and prolific round Murlough Bay in Antrim.
Flowering time is from March to May.
Primrose grows all over western Europe, the Balkans, the Crimea and North Africa. In eastern Europe, instead of being pale yellow the flowers are often a dull pink.