If you live in grass-growing country (as I do here in the southwest of England), one of the most elusive and evocative scents of summer is the smell of the sweet vernal grass – as charming in its name as in its perfume. It flowers from spring onwards,…
Lois Wakeman Posts
In previous years, the tiny fruits on my Amelanchier lamarkii tree (commonly called Juneberry) haven’t ripened that well, but this year, they are a dusky plum purple, and for a couple of days I’ve heard the soft ‘chip-chip-chip’ of a pair of blackbirds swooping hopefully about the garden.…
“Daisies are our silver, Buttercups our gold: This is all the treasure We can have or hold.” Thus runs a children’s hymn I remember from Sunday School in the 50s and early 60s. Innocent and charming, it was written by Jan Struther, to be sung to the tune…
In another post, I pondered on the variation you can find in some wildflowers, including red campion. In contrast, I’ve always been intrigued by the uniformity of the valerian plant (Centranthus ruber). This common plant of wayside and cliffs always flowers in one of three defined colours –…
Although I’ve been happily taking photos for many years and am pretty au fait with the technical side, it’s never too late to learn something new. I’ve been wanting to do more to promote my pottery for a while now, and today I learnt a lot! I was…
“Oak before ash, in for a splash; ash before oak, in for a soak” Thus runs the old country saying, suggesting that if the ash tree comes into leaf first, there will be more rain than if the oak tree does. This year, the ash trees are still…
Every year, I try to visit at least one beechwood at about this time, when the leaves are like fluttering scraps of lime green taffeta. This year I could only manage a short repeat visit to Lewesdon Hill, and this time, I took my infrared converted camera and…
On a dry and bright breezy day, I did this circular walk starting and finishing in the lovely village of Worth Matravers on the Isle of Purbeck. Up and down to the coast along steep combes, and a short stretch of the Coast Path. Walking down to the…
The flowering of the blackthorn tree is commonly associated, in folklore, with a “blackthorn winter” – a sudden unseasonal spell of cold and wet or snowy weather at the same time as the tree is in blossom. Given the very variable weather we get in an English spring,…