peacock

common, somewhat tattered, but exceptionally pretty, the peacock butterfly showing the deep abstraction so characteristic of Nature's painting. We saw orange tips, a brimstone, painted ladies and a fritillary of some sort all today so the butterfly season is well under way although it is not very easy to identify some (eg the fritillary) when the pack insist on pushing in to find out what it is that you are looking that can be so much more interesting than they.

greenfinch by magnolia

neatly combining two harbingers of real spring, the greenfinches are fighting each other and the magnolia is very slowly coming into flower.

bridge over untroubled water

the view looking downstream at Beals Mill. Nothing much changes around here (see link)

coming out

a hedge oak just on the verge of coming into leaf, and well before ash, so we are in for a splash

global wrapping

the new rural scene, away with green, let's have lots of polythene. Vincent eat your heart out.

St George's Day breakout

It's that time of year again. The Venterdon pond gang make a break for freedom, and review nesting places where no one can see them (except for the Orchard House mob who are watching every move). Spring is certainly springing.

pink purslane 2

Pink purslane is now naturalised to dark and shady places in the South West (? which must mean Cambourne). It is a native of North America and is closely related to Spring Beauty aka Indian lettuce, because it was used in salads and as a vegetable, or winter purslane and native Americans prized its bulbs as a food. PP is very common around here.

fields of silver

all of a sudden fields around here are being covered in acres of polythene. This is not natural. What happens to the polythene? And if it breaks down what does it break down to? Who has done research on the long term side effects? The only silver to come out of this will be that taken by agribusiness.

ramsons

the striking stellar flower of wild garlic (aka ramsons). Normally ramsons are slightly ahead of bluebells but this year the relatively cold weather of the last few weeks seems to have held the ramsons and a lot of other wild flowers back, and they are all going to flower together in May. Watch this space.

mob rule

two buzzards are being bullied by one agressive rook. You can almost hear the buzzard in the bottom photo saying "oi! you let go of my wing"

sheep's sorrel

much smaller and more compact than common sorrel, sheep's sorrel grows on grassy and heathy places often on bare patches with acid soils. Sorrel is supposed to be derived from the old french word surele meaning sour; the leaves contain calcium oxalate which can be poisonous in excess. Of interest (to me) sorrel was used as a herbal remedy for kidney and bladder problems. Most kidney stones are made of calcium oxalate and one might think that eating sorrel might well have made them worse.

green beetle

unidentified beetle on bed of moss with ivy leaf garnishing and drizzle of twigs

Tamar views 2

the Tamar in its valley, meandering eastwards, view towards Lamerhooe, Dartmoor in the far distance.

fighting sparrow

this house sparrow (grey cap on brown head) has caught his reflection in the window and is getting very cross at his doppelganger's assertive behaviour.

more marsh marigolds

a much better picture of this brilliant yellow flower. This is a large specimen with many stamens. For folklore see earlier page

mayflowers are back

in the week that we have been away the first of the mayflowers or cuckoo flowers have appeared. This pretty little flower has many common names including cuckoo flower, milkmaid and Our Lady's smock. Its first full flowering is commonly regarded as an accurate predictor of the arrival of the cuckoo itself. Richard Mabey, in Flora Britannica, suggests smock may have been slang for "a bit of skirt" and was suggestive of what went on in Spring meadows. Locally there is a variant complex double flowered variety (see previous page for more pictures and discussion, and link for a Spring song). Apart from its association with ancient patterns of human fertility, it was also believed in some places that anyone who picked the plant would be bitten by an adder, or that your house would be struck by lightning if you brought it indoors (are these metaphors for pregnancy?).

Rezare

the small village of Rezare, overlooking the Inny valley, just before a hail storm.

demolition works 2

More progress down at Beals Mill (see previous page)I am going to suggest to our parish council that it is renamed No Mill.

on the road to nowhere

early this morning a fit young female badger tried to cross a quiet country road. Cars and wildlife do not mix; drive slowly at night.

violet rant

the dog violets have been out for several weeks but it is time for their annual photo. We are all off on our holidays for a week, so, although Spot is staying behind to guard the kennels he will not have the time to post any new pages for the next week.

He also wants to know why Microsoft have made Vista (Home Premium) so incredibly difficult to use; are they the worst most unthoughtful anti consumerist company on the planet? Answers on a postcard, please. Could we connect a projector to our laptop? It would have been easier to travel to Mars. If I buy a new car I expect it to work (that means move when I want it to), not to sit there asking me if I am appropriately networked to the rest of the automobile industry, or to tell me to contact my local garage dealer. Apologies to all the ladies of the Kelly Bray WI for a much circumscribed illustrated talk on the wonders of our local area.

great spotted woodpecker

one of my favourite occasional visitors to our garden, looking rather goony today, with a very striking black moustache.

first of the season

the first marsh marigold (one flower in a sea of green) and the first greater stitchwort appear by the side of the Inny. We record these first sightings for future reference. Yellow and white flowers are difficult to photograph in the wild without a filter. The raw images have been modulated to exaggerate the detail and reduce the highlights.

stellar flowers

the beautiful flower of magnolia stellata, easily blighted by late frosts but bursting out now as the ground warms up. A native of Japan but very welcome in Cornwall.

slow to worm up

meanwhile, rising above all this colourful confusion and doing its best to look like a drab brown twig is this indolent slow worm warming up in the sun. So indolent indeed that it allowed me to move the leaves (of herb robert) covering its head to take a closer look, blinked a bit and went back to sleep.

white red green blue alkanet

green alkanet is a handsome plant with a vivid blue flower. The naming of the plant seems to suggest some degree of colour confusion; the name alkanet is thought to derive from the arabic al henna (arabic is very guttural) for red from the red dye extracted from its roots; I would have called it blue alkanet myself. Growing alongside this plant is a very unusual white variant, no doubt best called the white green blue red alkanet. The leaves are deeply fissured and the plant is described as "roughly hairy".

Duchy College

Duchy College, on a sunny Sunday morning after a very wet and windy Saturday. Unfortunately Spot has taken to chasing horses; they do not like it and if this blog stops suddenly it will be because he has had what passes for his brain kicked out of his very silly head.

sky kittens

we like the contrast between the catkins, now out in abundance, and the deep blue sky. Presumably catkin is a corruption of cats' skins but ... it turns out , on good authority (OED of etymology), that it probably comes from a corruption of the dutch word katteken or kitten, or the French word chaton.

celandine doggerel

the lesser celandine, closing up in the evening sun









There is a flower, the lesser celandine
That shrinks, like many more, from cold and rain
And, the first moment that the sun may shine
Bright as the sun himself, 'tis out again

by Uncle Max, with some assistance from WW

(did WW really get away with such trite verse?)

demolition works

industrial archaeology reveals the original mill (to the left) underneath the monstrous corrugated iron carbuncle at Beals Mill. Very soon the little cottages in the shadow of this great hulk will be bathed in light again ...we will keep an eye on the progress of the demolition work.

lesser periwinkle

lesser periwinkle (unimaginatively derived from the latin pervinca when it might have had all sorts of old english connotations). It is a ground covering plant, usually found near habitation, but growing wild in the south west. Good for fertility when eaten by both parties, and nose bleeds in Christians (and no one else?). It is a lovely light purple blue.

no more puppies

Cassie looking very excited about the arrival of a new puppy (Charlie J) in the family. Don't ask what Harri is doing.

anywhere but here

a grey heron fleeing the approach of the wolf pack. They are very shy creatures except when they are fishing in your ponds.

hellebores

a hellebore growing underneath a hedge tree. Not sure which type but probably a garden escapee, the purple edges are typical of stinking hellebore. Spread by snails, and used to make violent purgatives for worm infestations; unfortunately the treatment tended to kill the patient as well and thus fell (eventually) out of favour

falling between two pews

the villages of Venterdon and Stoke Climsland are situated between the methodist chapel on the left and the anglican church on the right. Unfortunately there is no pub between them. Dartmoor is visible bathed in sunlight on the far horizon to the left.

keeping up with the wistarias

our wistaria (named it would seem for an American anatomist, Caspar Wistar, hence the 'a' rather than an 'e', although everyone seems to spell it with an e enywey) is lagging behind the rest of the world (see link)

St Patrick's day wren

wrens love scavenging under bushes, and along with sparrows and tits are extremely busy now. They are difficult to capture on film because they are so quick and jumpy.

scurvy grass

scurvy grass (qv), spreading along road verges throughout Cornwall; it flourishes in the salty conditions that follow salting the roads in winter. The buildings in the distance are our local junior school, and if you enlarge the photo you will see some red blobs which are the children wearing their vivid red school jumpers out at morning play time.

Stoke Climsland and daffodils

our village and the church as seen from the main drive into Duchy College, our local university of agriculture, based at Home farm which used to be where Prince Charles stayed when he was visiting his Duchy (most of the rest of Cornwall).

very old ivy

I have never seen a stem of ivy as thick as this one invading a hedge oak like some alien monster emerging from the bowels of the earth ... corrugated iron by cornwall farmers associated

water falls

not ice but water, a small waterfall near Broadgate

mission control

Spot has also been quite taken by all the interesting interiors on other blogs so he would like to show you where he spends a lot of his time working on his blog. The painting on the right is by Rose Hilton, and the pastel on the left is by Bryan Pearce, two very interesting artists although for very different reasons. Poor Bryan is dead now but his work is going to live on for a very long time. Spot, of course, enjoys looking at himself.