Wordsworth's daffodils go online

The poet was inspired by the sight of wild daffodils by Ullswater

A website has been set up to monitor when the first daffodils of spring blossom in the Lake District.

It was created so "virtual visitors" will know exactly when the flowers that inspired the poet William Wordsworth are spotted for the first time in 2006.

The website, the Petal Peek bulb watch, has been set up by the Lake District National Park Authority.

The poet's famous poem "I wandered Lonely as a Cloud" was inspired by "dancing daffodils" at Ullswater.

The website was set up by Helen Reynolds, media advisor for the lake authority, after her friends in London asked her when the flowers were due to bloom.

Much earlier

She said: "I thought the website would be the ideal way of telling visitors what's blossoming here in the Lake District.

"My friends were very surprised when I said the daffodils came out in late March, as they bloom much earlier in the south."

The website, which is being managed by the Lake District Visitor Centre at Brockhole, on Windermere in Cumbria, is also tracking the progress of snowdrops, aconites, crocuses and tulips.

Wordsworth wrote his famous poem in 1815 at Dove Cottage, Grasmere, which is preserved as a memorial to his work by the Wordsworth Trust.