Coming out...

 

Spring is very much with us with much bee activity thank goodness and the bees love the bluebells thta have come out.

They were all over this on saturday morning too which was wonderful to se although a couple of wasps seemed to think I was worth exploring!

We're out

Weather has been a bit better in the last week so much has come out not least with wild flowers that have been well alone from the over use of lawnmowers which means it's of more use to wildlife than smooth expanses of grass.

While it looked as fresh horses had arrived not far away, the cowslips were out as I had my insect repellant on given it's prime tic season and them and me certainly don't mix.

It was good however to be out for a good couple of hours enjoying the countryside,

 

The allure of Flowers

Weather has been more conducive to being about this week and while out I took a couple of pictures .

The Foxglove as every schoolboy knows is poisonious has a most interesting fluted shape to its petals and is relatively common in the UK  and one the first flowers I identified while I was younger living nearer farms.

Walls provide a structure mosses and ivy can grow among often with flowers very close by such as here and this wall certainly dates to mid Victororian times.

Many people like flowers even as with Oak Cottage here they have no front garden so the owner of this has a small rustic window basket  by a short path that faces the road.

Flower Identification in the wild

 

One very useful skill is being able to identify different species of flowers while you are out exploring and this chart is most handy in that regard with its illustrations.

Getting about

 Monday it had to be said was a overcast shower-laden kind of a day here although I did get out, getting a little damp where ones padded waterproof jacket cut off exposing the bottom of my shorts and legs to the elements.

That somewhat damp month we had as you can see in the picture above has helped a lot of things to come out such as the dandelions ready to disperse their seeds and nettles which obviously one has to be mindful of having caught myself a few years ago out hiking by one next to a stile.

This lush vegetation was near the canal where a variety of insects were seeing hovering about as I keeping my eye out for gnats and tics both of which are bad news if they get on me being prone to strong reactions.

Whatever things may come to make getting out difficult, whatever extra steps you may need to take just doing so I feel is well worth the effort.

Spring is here

 

Weekend was suprisingly warm for time of year with Saturday seeing some 18 degrees out so need for jerseys or coats even as I went about, talking with people while looking at how much of the blossoms had come back and if there was much acitvity by say bees or butterflies as normally I'd expect to see some and indeed about a few weeks back I did see one bee resting on the pavement.

Gardening was a passion of my late grandad and Mum too so we had many in large and not so large pots on the front garden like this example.

A spot of colour from the garden

As I type this out, it is quite warm with many flowers about but sadly rather wet with heavy showers so I won't be out today.

This doesn't mean that such great specimens cannot be shared  such as this from our front garden with its most vivid stamens.

Although a bit battered by the winds, these add some lovely colour to the scene and help attract visitors such as the fawn with white spotted butterfly I saw on Saturday.

Bursting out

Weekend has been quite warm and sunny as we enter Spring proper which is an ideal time for exploring and learning.

I remarked a short while back about the Daffodils and at least those in the colder bit of this area have come out having been planted several years back by the community to try to diversify some of the short grass patches we have dotted about and provide more interest.

Over near the nursery other things are springing up supporting a good deal of insect life which I had noticed this last few days.

I saw the first honey bees out on Friday in their fawny shade apart from a few bumble bees, one butterfly and a wasp.

The daffodils are out!

 Yesterday was somewhat breezy out which is typical of the rather up and down weather we appear to going through presently.

Strangely different parts of this area seem to have the signs of Spring occurring to very differing degrees where our estate appears to be a bit milder leading to daffodils coming out the area along the main road and canal have only just started.

This on a "green" alongside that road emerged a couple of days ago and is of a different species to that of those found elsewhere being dark yellow all over on the head.

I also saw yesterday my first Bumble Bee of the year going around a garden which is most odd for this time of year.

A colourful morning

Been a pretty warm sunny week so far for exploring.

Many of the flowers remain out even if some of trees are starting to shred their foliage providing food for the bees that are still out and the butterfly some of which I was just point four of a metre away from.

One thing I did have to back away from at speed was a hornet exploring the meadows where after spotting him just in the direction I wanted to go he decided to go for me! 

This group of flowers with the almost burnt orange petals held my attention for a bit with those colours.

The way things just are

 Headed out although I hadn't been feeling to good so far.

What I find fascinating is just how it is a tree just throws out its branches, going out quite some way and here it forms the division of two separate rights of way either side of it that you must keep to  to avoid the areas grazed or planted. 

While exploring this week I spotted these wild flowers in with some mixed vegetation towards the far end of the field, a sure sign they had been getting plenty of moisture.

There are some who'd of taken cutters to some of the grasses but I prefer to leave things in situ and anyway nature isn't highly composed in the way a gardener might set out his or her lawn. 

Exploring - the Wild members

 

Arresting colour could be had without going far while we were away and the bumble bees were pretty wild over these as I was for other reasons.

Wild flowers were in abundance wherever there was space to grow and there was plenty of that around the area we walked in which was delightful.

In better weather it would of been the ideal backdrop while enroute on an walk for a picnic with your flask, sandwiches and cake.

Exploring - nature at the base

This week as promised I'm looking at my time away last week and I'll begin today with two pictures of plants with flowers where I stayed around South Lakeland in what was a stone built two storey building extended and extensively modernized while keeping much of its period charm.

One advantage of its elevated position is the excellent views across Morecombe Bay towards Heysham and Barrow In Furness with its sand dunes although you certainly notice it walking down the hardcore covered steep unadopted road.

There were a number of honey bees there but we never saw a wasp although there was much vegetation that one would of thought of attracted them.

There were a fair number of trees within the grounds and these are two good examples of them

An array of colour

 

Another warm weekend here as we look at flower objects near the canal, with these being really vibrant although I had to mindful of the bumble bees that loved collecting the nectar from them  and bity insects that can make me very ill.

Buttercups are a thing that fascinated me from a young age not least because at our original junior school we had them in the verges of the school and also tending to grow on the school pitch which was used for football.

These were found growing at the verge of a wall near the canal itself and so intermingled with other things like the Nettle which was a bain of my schoolboy years often catching my legs on them and needing anti histamine tablets to deal with the sting and rash.

Of meadows and flowers

Today we're moving more at fauna and flora in exploring that area and we'll start here with this restful meadow with clovers which I loved.

Things that grow along the edges and hedges of paths can be easily missed by an eye that's trained just on looking ahead but this was really colourful, attracting butterflies and bees.

Wild flowers in the wild are more my thing than cultivated and planted in groups but these seemed to have found each other on a grass verge overlooking the canal towpath.

This was impressive and not to creased from being blown about. I used the telezoon end of the lens to help throw the background out a little while remembering to lock the focus on the flower.
I prefer manual focusing for tasks like this.

There was much to see and more importantly the walk itself was calming for seeing open countryside, meadowland and flowers that I forgot about time altogether while out.

Summer exploration

The Cub or for some of us Wolf Cub in spirit is active, keeping himself fit physically and mentally alert both indoors and out  even if as with yesterday I was restricted due to the torrential rain to where I could go and had to dry off.

The countryside is not a bowling green, flat and devoid of interest but has wild plants and flowers that support a rich environment with many insects which I have an interest in such as the white and red admiral butterflies that were dancing around me this weekend.

Wild flowers have always interested me from a boy from the poppies that grew on the now decommissioned mineral railway line that which just behind of our house and the along the paths and hedgerows of the farms nearby.

Carefully studying them, noting how they are growing the various species of insects around them is one way I keep my mental alertness up.