Bursting into Life

I do love this time of year, a few sunny days and everything bursts into life.  Today I noticed that one of my Cedric Morris irises - Benton Deirdre had opened. If you're watching or visiting the Chelsea Flower Show next week look out for them as they are appearing there for the first time in many years.

All the aquilegias have opened this week too, mainly self sown and I tend to leave them where they chose to be unless they're really in the way.

and some more clematis have opened too, the one on the left is called Vino, the one on the right is some kind of montana that was here when I moved in.

Two roses have opened this week, the single chinensis rose 'Mutabilis'

and Abraham Darby.

There's still a lot of blue around as the ceanothus has opened (sadly I think it'll have to come out when it's finished flowering as it's leaning across the path and I have to scramble under it to get past)

But I'll leave you with a photo not taken in my garden but at Arger Fen, a Suffolk Wildlife reserve which I called into after work one day last week.

And I heard a cuckoo, black caps and willow warblers as well as seeing the bluebells :-)

The March of Summer

The builders are working next door (and in a terraced house 'next door' is very close) so I've been escaping as much as possible. Yesterday I decided to leave the brick dust and blaring radio and headed off to Arger Fen, my favourite local wood.

Despite it being the school holidays there was hardly anyone about (they all probably knew it was about to rain, I clearly didn't!).

There were lots of wild flowers about: thistles, hawkweed, rosebay willow herb and greater stitchwort amongst others.

But there were also signs that summer is moving ever onward: teasels, blackberries (quite a few of which came home with me), elder berries, rose hips and sloes.

I walked to the large pond

(not actually a part of Arger Fen reserve but very beautiful) where I sat and watched dragonflies darting and swallows flying high.  This is when the heavens opened and I got very wet as I was a good way away from cover and by the time I got back to cover it had stopped raining!

If you want to see where I escaped to last week hop over to Celia's blog to read about our day out in London.

A Bank Holiday Walk

We had lovely weather here over the bank holiday so I decided to set off on a walk to Cornard Mere, the Suffolk Wildlife Trust reserve that I'd read about when writing my post on bluebells.  I'd been a little worried that I wouldn't be able to find the footpath but as you can see it was very clear.

The ground was a dry as dust, apparently we get less rainfall here than the Sahara Desert does but we're not classed as a desert as our rain is spread throughout the year.

The website had said to 'take the footpaths to the south and the west to view the reserve' which is what I did.   However 'view' might not quite be the right word.  Every now and then, if I clambered through the nettles I got a tantalising glimpse of the wetland, but it was so over grown I couldn't really 'view' the main mere at all!

(Click on the photo above to enlarge it and you'll just see the main open mere in the background)

At one point there were lots of reeds which must give shelter to many birds and wildlife.

Despite not seeing any water birds, nor indeed hearing the elusive water rail (which was what I really wanted to hear), it was a lovely walk around the edge of the reserve and I did hear and see a chiffchaffs and blackcaps.

Chiffchaff

Time for the return walk, across the field towards the hedges of hawthorn

and the verges of cow parsley.

A nice walk, just not quite what I'd expected - I hope you all had a good bank holiday too.

A Walk Through Bluebells

There's something special about a carpet of bluebells.

Fran and I had nipped over to Arger Fen (part of Suffolk Wildlife Trust) and even on a dull day they were beautiful.

The contrast with the new green growth on the trees was soul lifting.

Some were in areas with other wild flowers, Greater Stitchwort and Yellow Archangel here.

We also saw an Early Purple orchid and heard a chiffchaff, cuckoo and a blackcap.  (The blackcap  warning call was identified thanks to the amazingness of twitter).

Close up bluebells always amaze me with their delicacy.

I've now discovered that I can walk from our country park to another Suffolk Wildlife Trust reserve, Cornard Mere - it has Water Rail, I am rather excited. I'll let you know how I get on.