A Visit to Minsmere

26 Mon May 2014

Posted by Clare Pooley in plants, Rural Diary, walking, wild birds

Tags

Avocet, BBC's Springwatch, Bird's-foot Trefoil, Bittern, Cuckoo, greylags, Highland Cattle, marshes, Minsmere, Mute Swan, Nightingale, Oystercatcher, Pop-Up Café, Rabbit, RSPB, Sand martin, sea, Sea Kale, Sluice, tank traps, The Scrape, Whitethroat

For several weeks I have been wanting to re-visit Minsmere. Minsmere is a bird reserve run and owned by the RSPB (the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds) to which all four of us belong. Minsmere is also the RSPB’s so-called ‘flag-ship’ reserve – the biggest and best in the country and we are lucky enough to live just a few miles from it. There were three main reasons why I wished to go to Minsmere – I hadn’t been there for ages and missed it – I wanted to hear a nightingale again and there is usually a nightingale to be heard there at this time of year and lastly – I had heard that the BBC would be filming their Springwatch programmes there for the next three weeks starting on Monday 26th May and I wanted to go before they arrived.

R has been on annual leave this last week so we decided that we should go to Minsmere on Friday afternoon. E and I had a very early start on Friday – up at 6.15am for me and 6.30am for her as she had a hospital appointment to go to in Norwich at 8.30am and we needed to leave the house at 7.15am to get there on time. When that was over E decided she would like to do some shopping for books so we called in at Waterstones and she made a couple of purchases. We then went to HMV to look at DVDs etc. and then we had lunch in a coffee shop. We returned home via Beccles for more shopping. Fortunately the weather had stayed dry for all of our journey.

R and I had a hot drink and a chat while I rested after my busy morning and then we set off. There was a slight shower of rain as we drove there but it had all cleared away by the time we had parked the car in the carpark. We decided to go towards the sea first and walked past the wildlife ponds near the Visitor Centre. There is a sandy cliff behind the visitor centre where Sand Martins nest each year. The Martins were very busy nesting and catching insects, flying low over our heads. We were very pleased to hear a Cuckoo calling all the time we were there. We hadn’t heard one for some years.

The rabbits on the reserve have no fear of humans

The path starts off over heathland and then carries on towards the sea on a raised bank through water meadows and marshland.

On our right to the south is Sizewell ‘B’ nuclear power station with Sizewell ‘A’ behind it.

On our left are the Coastguard Cottages on land owned by the National Trust.

This is looking back along the path we had just walked. It has recently been re-laid and covered with gravel. Crunching along these paths is a noisy business and all the birds disappear as soon as anyone steps onto them. A lot of damage was done here during the storm surge in December and in the high winds and flooding during the winter; the RSPB have worked very hard trying to put things right again. They also like to make as much of the reserve accessible to the disabled as possible – and – the BBC are filming one of the country’s most popular programmes here so it must look really neat and well cared for!

The entrance to the beach.

The dunes at the top of the beach.

At last we got to the sea. The sky out at sea looked very threatening but overhead was bright and sunny.

This is looking north towards the town of Southwold. The lighthouse was flashing its light so conditions and visibility at sea mustn’t have been good. I tried to get a photo with the light from the lighthouse shining but couldn’t.

Sea Kale growing on the beach

These are tank traps that were put here at the beginning of the Second World War. If there had been an invasion it was hoped these might hold up the tanks for a while. There are many mementos of wartime in Britain, especially round the coast.

PD James’ book ‘Unnatural Causes’ is set here on the Suffolk coast. One of characters in the book dies a most unpleasant death in one of the hides along the beach.

The sandy path that runs between the dunes and the reeds of the reserve. We had walked by the sea for a while but an extremely stiff and cold onshore breeze was blowing so I escaped to the warm shelter of this path.

Bird’s-foot Trefoil growing at the side of the path.

We went into one of the hides further along the beach and sat and looked inland across the Scrape at the birds nesting, eating, wading and getting on with their lives on the reserve. The hide we were in had been damaged some time over winter and had no roof but as the weather was so lovely it didn’t matter much. The birds were aware of our presence and didn’t get too close. We were still able to see a lot through binoculars but we weren’t able to photograph much.

These are greylags with goslings.

An Oystercatcher.

A poor photo of an Avocet. You can almost see its long upturned bill!

Mute Swans and other waders, ducks and gulls.

We eventually decided to move on and left the beach by another gate further south from the one we’d entered by. There is a sluice there. Water levels are monitored all the time. The Scrape and lagoon need to have enough water in them but water levels must not get too high. The RSPB works with other groups such as the owner of the nuclear power station and the National Trust to maintain flood defences.

Views over the marshes.

A photo of a Whitethroat singing from the top of a bush. We couldn’t get any closer I’m afraid so it’s not very clear.

Highland cattle are used for marshland grazing. They also use (or used to use) Konic Ponies for the same purpose.

We walked back towards the woods on the noisy path listening to Sedge Warblers and Whitethroats and many more birds along the way. We saw that the whole reserve was wired for sound. There were cables everywhere and cameras attached to nest boxes and every now and then we came across one or two people working in ditches and under bushes trying to fix something. In the woods we also found a Pop-Up Café.

This was run by an enterprising East European couple. R and I had the best coffee I’ve ever had. It cost us £5.00 for two coffees which is very expensive for Suffolk but we did get two free pastries with it. The girl put a pretty pattern on the top of mine.

After eating our pain au chocolat and drinking our coffee we walked a little way up into the wood and sat listening to the birds. We heard a Bittern ‘booming’ which we were pleased about but unfortunately we weren’t able to hear a nightingale. It was becoming late by this time and we decided to go home. The BBC is only filming on Mondays to Thursdays so I may go back next Friday and just walk round the wood and try to hear the nightingale. A and I walked here a few years ago listening to one singing and we even saw it too. When I first moved to Suffolk in 1988 I lived in Halesworth and I used to be able to hear nightingales singing all night from the Folly on the edge of the town. Sadly there are fewer Nightingales about and I haven’t heard one for about four years.

A Hotch Potch.

16 Fri May 2014

Posted by Clare Pooley in Gardening, Insects, plants, Rural Diary, trees, wild animals, wild birds

≈ 6 Comments

Tags

Allium, Alpine Pasque Flower, Ant hill, aquilegia, Balm of Gilead, Bee, blackberry, Bramley Apple blossom, Cacti, Cedar of Lebanon, chaffinch, Christmas Cactus, Clematis, Common Sedge, Common Vetch, Cotoneaster, Damson, GERANIUM, Goat Willow seeds, Great Tit, hare, Hawthorn, Holly, House Spider, Japanese Maple, Jay, Knautica, moon, Muntjac, pheasant, Shrub rose Canary Bird, Spindle, stock dove, sunset, thrift, Thyme-leaved Speedwell, Tufted Duck, vegetable garden, Viburnum, White-Shouldered House Moth, winter-flowering honeysuckle, Zebra Spider

Last evening while I was admiring the pink sunset…..

….E was admiring the rising of the moon. She called to me to come and see it as it was so large and orange. I joined her at her bedroom window and we watched it slowly slide up the sky behind the trees. I went into my room hoping to see it more clearly from there and saw below me on the drive, the hare again! Typically, I had the wrong camera with me, it was too dark and the hare wouldn’t stay and be photographed.

This is the only photo I managed to get.

I went outside into the twilight with little bats flying about the garden and crossed the road and looked at the moon through the hedge. It wasn’t orange any more but it was still beautiful.

The visit from the hare and the rising moon reminded me that hares are supposed to be magical and people today still take care not to hurt a hare. One of Mum’s neighbours was new to the area a few years ago and asked another neighbour how he could get rid of the rabbits and hares which were damaging the trees and plants in his garden. He was told that the rabbits could be shot but ‘we don’t shoot hares in Suffolk’. In Anglo Saxon mythology, Ostara the goddess of the moon, fertility and Spring was often depicted with hare’s ears or a hare’s head. Eostre (where we get the word Easter from) was the Celtic version of Ostara and was the goddess associated with the moon, death, redemption and resurrection during the turning of Winter into Spring. Eostre was a shape-shifter too and took the shape of a hare at each full moon. Well, well, well! (I looked all that up using Google!).

Yesterday was a busy one with my usual shopping with Mum and then going to Halesworth to hand in my prescription at the surgery and post a couple of letters. I got home just after 2.00pm and had some lunch. The afternoon was spent dusting, vacuuming and doing more mending. R got home just as I was finishing. He had had a fraught day at work so after we had had our cup of tea he went into the garden and planted out his peas and beans. A soothing task which took him over an hour and was all done except the watering-in by the time I had cooked the evening meal.

This morning I went out to admire his handiwork.

Putting the anti-rabbit/deer/hare/pigeon etc barriers up had taken most of the time yesterday. We hope they work! You can see the potatoes coming up in the bed behind the peas and beans. While I was down at the vegetable patch I had a look at the pond and saw a strange looking duck. I tried taking its photo with my small camera but wasn’t able to get a clear picture. I fetched our newer, better camera and tried again.

I think this is a female tufted duck who visited to sample the fish in our pond. I had to crop the photos as I still couldn’t get near enough to the duck. The pond, as you see, is covered in the fluffy seeds of Goat Willow. The seeds aren’t only on the pond but are everywhere, floating in the air, covering the grass, coming into the house.

This is a spider’s web I noticed yesterday on the outside of one of our windows. It is covered with fluffy willow seeds. Despite my brushing the web away very often the spider insists on making its web just there all the time.

The rest of this post will be a strange selection of photos that I took today and some others that I haven’t been able to put in any of my recent posts.

This is a late entry in the apple blossom awards. We thought the Bramley Apple wasn’t going to flower this year, but we were wrong!

The Cedar of Lebanon has new leaves growing that look like old-fashioned shaving brushes.

All the hollies have new leaves too.

The Japanese Maple has the most beautiful cherry-red seeds.

It has beautiful leaves too that glow in the sunshine.

I got home yesterday and saw a Jay in the garden. I had great difficulty taking these photos from inside the car.

This is one of my Christmas Cacti and it is flowering again for the third time in six months. It first flowered in November, then in February and now in May. I think it is very confused!

R’s cacti are all coming in to flower too.

Mammalaria

Mammalaria flower

Peanut cactus flower.

I don’t know what this one is called.

The little white Alliums in the garden are very popular with the bees. They are under the laburnum trees which are also full of bees and the noise they make is astounding. I think they sound like cars in a grand prix race – the pitch is almost exactly the same – it’s like listening to a race about a mile away.

The new shoots on the Viburnum Bodnantense are crimson.

Tiny damsons.

Willow seeds.

Bee on the cotoneaster horizontalis.

Geranium Phaeum in R’s flowerbed.

Flowers on the Spindle tree.

The Hawthorn hedge at the bottom of the garden near the old summerhouse.

A White-shouldered House Moth

R took these photos of a muntjac deer.

A chaffinch

One of my herbs – cedronella canariensis (Balm of Gilead).

Alpine Pasque Flower

A Great Tit

A Stock Dove.

A female Pheasant.

A Zebra Spider. These spiders are only about 4mm long. They are jumping spiders and can leap a distance of about 4cm.

A baby House Spider.

The tiny flowers of Thyme-Leaved Speedwell.

Aquilegia flower

Thrift flower

The wonderfully scented Clematis Montana ‘Rubens’

Shrub rose ‘Canary Bird’

Blackberry flowers

Knautica Macedonica

Aquilegia flower

Reflections in the pond

Common sedge

Common Vetch

An ant hill

Male Holly flower buds. We don’t have any female holly bushes so no berries!

Heart-shaped berries of the Winter-flowering Honeysuckle

These lovely berries don’t last long as the blackbirds find them irresistible.

A Good Day

15 Thu May 2014

Posted by Clare Pooley in churches, plants, Rural Diary, trees, walking, wild birds

≈ 6 Comments

Tags

barley, Common Whitebeam, Early Purple Spotted Orchid, English Oak, field maple, Lady's Smock, Lesser Whitethroat, Oak-apples, orange-tip butterfly, Red Clover, Red Horse Chestnut, Red May, St Michaels church, St Peter's church, stag-headed, the Beck, Turtle Doves, Willow Warbler, Wych Elm

I had a very good day yesterday. The weather was much better than it had been for a week and I was nearly back to normal after my cold. I hung some washing out on the line in the garden and then set off for Bungay where I had to get some shopping. Just as I was nearing Flixton I noticed some birds at the side of the road, mainly woodpigeons but among them were a pair of Turtle Doves. I was so pleased to see them I nearly shouted out loud! Turtle Doves are becoming so rare, not only because of the reduction of places to nest in this country but also because of the dangers they face during migration – being shot for sport for example – and the lack of suitable places to spend the winter because of deforestation in Africa. Even if we get no Turtle Doves in our garden this year I am happy that there are at least one pair in this area! Their song epitomises high summer for me – a lovely drowsy, purring noise. We used to get them every year and they stayed around until the end of August. In recent years we have had a Turtle Dove sing for a day or so and then go off elsewhere in search of a mate. Last year they didn’t turn up at all. Many people believed that was because of the terrible spring we had had. Turtle Doves had arrived in this country and then we had the late snow and frost which killed some birds and others just turned round and went back to France.

I went to my usual car park in the centre of town and noticed all the trees planted around the car park had come into flower. They are all Red May trees – Red Hawthorns – and look so pretty with their deep pink flowers.

Red Mays are not as popular here as where I grew up in Kent. My father thought they were wonderful and planted one in one of the houses we had when I was a girl. As I walked about the town I remembered having seen another red-blossomed tree recently and thought I would go and have a closer look at it later in the day.

I found the opportunity to go for a quick walk in the early afternoon. The day had warmed up considerably but there were still a few black clouds around. As I walked down to the end of our lane and out into the next I listened to a Willow Warbler singing in the top branches of a group of trees nearby. The Willow Warbler is another bird whose song I couldn’t do without – it has a sweet song of descending notes in a minor key. Weep, weep, weep, weep it says and makes my heart swell and I find I am near to tears at the beauty of it. It is another bird whose numbers are reducing drastically. Again, we used to hear them all summer long but not any more. I hope this one finds a mate and stays to sing for me. I stood under the Field Maple tree it was singing in and eventually saw it in the top canopy. It sang and then busily flitted from twig to twig in search of food and then sang again. I tried to photograph it but wasn’t quick enough.

This is the result. Can you see it? No, neither can I.

On the corner of our lane where it meets the other lane is a wide area of common land and a couple of ornamental trees have been planted there. One is a Sweet Chestnut which is only just coming into leaf and the other is a Whitebeam, a native tree but not one that usually grows in this part of the country.

Common Whitebeam tree

Common Whitebeam blossom

Common Whitebeam blossom

The grass of this patch of common land was covered in Lady’s Smock flowers and a female Orange Tip butterfly was feeding from them.

The red-blossomed tree that I had remembered seeing is a Red Horse Chestnut and it had been planted only a couple of hundred yards down this other lane. To get to it I had to cross yet another wide area of common land and in doing so I was surprised to see an Early Purple Spotted Orchid in the grass. This one was a little past its best but I rather liked the colour combination of the petals.

There was more Bugle or Ajuga flowers and some Red Clover.

Red Clover

I love the pale markings on Red Clover leaves. I am also fascinated by the grass in the photo which is just about to flower. It looks like a row of tiny balls are packed into the grass stem or a lot of minuscule snails.

The Red Horse Chestnut is a fairly young tree so I was able to photograph the flowers easily.

A Red Horse Chestnut is a hybrid between a Horse Chestnut and a Red Buckeye. On the way back to the road I found another Early Purple Spotted Orchid.

Our lane is looking very nice at the moment.

On my way back home I heard another summer bird but this was one I hadn’t heard before. It’s song was a little like a part of a Chaffinch’s or a Yellowhammer’s song but without the end flourish. It also had a few little sweet quiet notes to start off the song and they sounded very much like a Warbler. When I got back I listened to a few of my bird recordings and found I had been listening to a Lesser Whitethroat.

I managed to get all my washing dried outside which was really good and took some more photos of the garden while I fed the birds. I had started on a great heap of mending by the time R came home from work. He didn’t seem to want his evening meal straight away so I suggested a walk across the fields.

This is one of many ancient oaks we saw on our walk. Once they get to about seven or eight hundred years old they start to die back a little. A little like us humans: when we get to a certain age we start to shrink a bit too. When they get dead branches sticking out of the top of the canopy they are described as being ‘stag-headed’.

A young Horse Chestnut.

View over the fields.

A field of ripening barley.

A Sycamore tree with flowers.

The Beck

Bridge over the Beck.

Views across the fields on the other side of the Beck.

The lane going up the hill from St Peter’s Washes.

Another ancient oak tree. I think this one’s trunk must be about twelve feet in circumference – it must easily be about a thousand years old. I must try to bring a tape measure with me next time we walk this way and see if I can get through the hedge and measure it.

I love standing under trees and looking up through the branches. Trees are the most magnificent awe-inspiring things.

We looked down across the fields in the direction from which we’d come and then down the lane. Many people think that East Anglia has no hills and no hedges. This proves that we do have both though the hills aren’t very steep or high.

St Peter’s church over the field.

Fruits on an Oak Tree.

The top of the tower of St Michael’s church can just be seen above the trees.

More views across the fields from the top of the lane.

The signpost at the end of the lane.

Another view from the top.

An oak-apple with fruits

An oak-apple.

This is a picture of a Lesser Whitethroat! It is just below and just to the left of centre and has a curly leaf over its face. You’ll have to take my word for it that it really was a Lesser Whitethroat.

A Wych Elm and fruits.

Toadstools

Late sunshine.

We walked back home quite content and I cooked our evening meal.

A Wet Day

14 Wed May 2014

Posted by Clare Pooley in churches, Gardening, plants, Rural Diary, trees, wild birds

≈ 6 Comments

Tags

ash die-back, ash tree, calendula, clouds, collared dove, Eye, lupin, moon, Rain, Rumburgh, St Chrysostom's prayer, St Michael and All Saints and St Felix church, St Peter and St Paul's church, yellow iris

The past couple of days have been fairly busy doing mainly mundane chores. Fortunately, I am feeling much better and have regained what little energy I usually have.

View from our front door on Sunday after one of many showers

I took Mum to church again on Sunday morning. A windy day with lots of heavy showers. Her church is currently full of scaffolding and difficult to get around. Quite a few years ago they bought a new second-hand organ at a bargain price (still many thousands of pounds I believe). They took out their old one and sold it on but before they could put in the new one somebody thought it might be a good idea to make a Parish Room with a kitchen and toilets too. This could be done more easily without the organ being in place. The church is quite a wealthy one but even so, some time was spent fund-raising and then all the architects reports, and surveyors reports and moving of tombs etc took even more time. Bits of organ pipe and casing were handed out to all and sundry to look after at home as there was no-where to store the new organ in the church. All money raised was spent on the Parish Room and the church had to make do with a little electric organ. At last the Parish Room was finished and everyone was pleased with the result. Saving up for the installation of the organ was resumed and was going very well until the boiler broke down and had to be replaced. Fortunately, some very generous parishioner kindly paid for a new boiler for the church. At last, a few weeks ago the installation of the organ began and should be completed in time for the arrival of their new priest in the Autumn. When I got to church with Mum on Sunday even more scaffolding had been erected as they had decided to investigate a large damp patch that had appeared above the Rood Screen. They also have a Doom painting up there (covered with whitewash) which they want to look at to see that it isn’t deteriorating too much.

I had lunch when I got home and then spent a quiet afternoon reading, checking e-mails, feeding the birds and preparing the vegetables for our evening meal. Our church had an Evening Prayer service at 6.30pm and R and I went along at 5.45pm to get everything ready. It is fortunate that the lovely prayer of St Chrysostom is used during Morning and Evening Prayer, because if it wasn’t one might be tempted to wonder if there was much point in having the service. There were only five of us there including poor Maurice who had prepared a very thought-provoking homily and led the service so well.

‘Almighty God, who hast given us grace at this time with one accord to make our common supplications unto thee; and dost promise that when two or three are gathered together in thy Name thou wilt grant their requests…’

Monday was another showery day with a few rumbles of thunder as well. I did a lot of supermarket shopping and washing and other necessary jobs around the house. I took a few photographs in the garden in-between the showers.

The tallest tree here is a lovely Ash tree. It upsets me to think that it probably will be dead in ten years time because of Ash die-back disease

The lane in front of our house is looking particularly green at the moment.

A lupin in R’s flower-bed

Calendula/Pot Marigold in R’s flowerbed

Yellow Iris in bud by the pond

You can tell by the Collared Doves’ blurred feet that it was moving fast and I had difficulty keeping up!

The sky gradually got cloudier and more stormy-looking as the day progressed.

Living in the (fairly) flatlands of East Anglia you can always see what the weather’s going to be like before it gets to you.

This is a plane from one of the local air bases

I was glad I wasn’t flying before the storm.

I got indoors just in time.

(If anyone is wondering why there is a brick on top of the cage over the ground bird feeder, it is to try to stop squirrels lifting up the lid and eating all the bird seed.)

By dusk the rain had stopped and the moon had risen.

A Windy Day and a Wet Blanket

09 Fri May 2014

Posted by Clare Pooley in Gardening, plants, Rural Diary, trees, wild birds

≈ 12 Comments

Tags

Escallonia 'Apple Blossom', greylags, laburnum, moorhens, peas, potatoes, runner beans, tomatoes

The day began sparklingly. Green and blue so intense and raindrops scintillating in the sun and breeze. I went out into the garden quite early to open the greenhouse and have a wander about. The wind was picking up and blossom was flying from the trees. I went back indoors and collected my camera.

The greylags keep paying us flying visits. The female goes onto the island and sorts over the old nest. Poor thing ! I wonder what happened while we were away. Did the eggs hatch out and then did she lose her goslings or did they not hatch at all? Did something (an otter?) eat the eggs or were they infertile?

Amusingly, while the female was busy on the island the gander was attacked by a moorhen. Moorhen are quite feisty birds when they want to be and despite being much smaller than the gander, this one made the gander run very fast! I walked round to the far side of the big pond and could hear moorhen chicks calling but couldn’t see them in the thick reeds. Moorhens feed their chicks until they are quite big and are very caring parents until they are spooked. They then run off as fast as their silly feet allow them, leaving the chicks to fend for themselves! Why?

I had a look at R’s vegetable patch and admired the potatoes already coming up.

We are growing two types of potato – white mid-season and red lates. I like it when R grows potatoes as they store well and I don’t need to buy them from about August until Christmas or later.

The trees were whipping about in the wind so I thought I’d better take a picture of the laburnums before the wind and rain stripped them of all their flowers.

These laburnum trees were meant to look the same, as I have been hoping to make a little arch with them. But look at them! One is squat and spreading outwards and the other is reaching for the skies! I will still try to make an arch but I don’t think it will end up looking like ‘Homes and Gardens’ material. They also grew A LOT last year and I didn’t get my act together and do anything with the trees at the right time – oh dear!

Escallonia ‘Apple Blossom’. The book I have says this is a dense evergreen shrub. This one is not at all dense and I’m not sure why not. Other Escallonias we’ve had in the past have been really good shrubs – good enough for hedging with, but this loses all its leaves in the middle and a number of branches die off after a year or two. I think I will cut it hard back and see what happens. It may also need a lot of feeding as the soil it’s in is a little stony.

I went into the greenhouse.

Some of R’s runner bean plants.

And some of his peas.

His tomato seedlings are doing well too.

The heavy showers started shortly after I returned to the house and they’ve continued on and off all day. A couple of times I’ve ventured out only to have to dash back in again, usually from the furthest parts of the garden.

And if you are wondering where the wet blanket comes in – that’s me with my woolly head and deafness, my runny nose and tickly cough.

The Archdeacon’s Visitation.

08 Thu May 2014

Posted by Clare Pooley in amphibians, churches, Gardening, plants, Rural Diary, trees, Uncategorized, wild birds

≈ 6 Comments

Tags

aquilegia, Archdeacon's Visitation, Easter cactus, Halesworth, hare, lilac, newts, rowan, St Mary's church, woodpigeon

I am amazed at how lucky we were with the weather on Monday! Since then the weather has been ‘changeable’ as the forecasters say. Tuesday had showers in the morning but a sunny, breezy afternoon, Wednesday had light showers in the early morning, a very fine middle of the day and then heavy showers from late afternoon onwards and today, well, yuk! is all I can say. Light showers this morning, heavy showers by midday and persistent rain this afternoon and evening. What makes it worse is that I have a nasty cold in the head. I had hoped to go with R to the Archdeacon’s Visitation service at St Mary’s church in Halesworth this evening but E needed to see her doctor and the only available appointment time was 6.30pm. I drove her home afterwards and saw R driving past us in the opposite direction on his way to the service and there wasn’t enough time for me to drop E at home and join him. And anyway, I think I’m better off at home not spreading germs about.

An Archdeacon’s visitation, as far as I understand it, is when all the Churchwardens (R is a Churchwarden) in the Deanery get together for a special service once a year with all their priests and the Archdeacon. They hand in their annual reports and accounts if they haven’t already done it on-line and also their Declaration. Churchwardens are supposed to serve for six years at most, I think, and then a new one is voted in. However, it usually is a case of ‘once a Churchwarden always a Churchwarden’, as no-one wants the job. The Churchwardens are ‘sworn in’, for want of a proper phrase at this special service and take their oaths to do their duty. A few hymns are sung and this sounds lovely as only large churches are chosen for this service and they are always full. The Archdeacon has his or her say and maybe some of the priests will give a talk too. This year there will be an extra item. Our Rector and the priest in the Benefice next to ours will be licensed to each others Benefice. This will mean that they will be able to serve in each others Benefice without having to get special permission each time from the Bishop. Our Rector looks after a Benefice of eleven churches with a couple of retired priests, one Reader and two Elders to help him. The priest in the Benefice next to ours looks after three churches one of which is in a town. It will make life much easier for our Rector especially, once this is done. Our Rector is due to retire in a very few years and we don’t know if we will get another priest to replace him. We think there will be a lot of changes and not for the better and our priests are preparing the ground for us. To add insult to injury we haven’t even got a Bishop at the moment and haven’t had for some time!

I wanted to go to the service, not only to support R and our church but to go into St Mary’s church again. When I first moved to Suffolk in 1988 I lived in Halesworth and attended St Marys. I was made very welcome at the church and made a number of friends. I also met R there and he asked me out while drinking coffee after a Sunday service. We had our Marriage Blessing Service there too. R has just returned and tells me the service went well and the refreshments afterwards were very good.

I have been able to take a few photos round the garden during the past few days.

Our Rowan or Mountain Ash tree is flowering. It has grown well in the last couple of years and this is the best it’s ever looked.

Rowan blossom.

A very poor photo of the newts in our front pond.

White lilac.

White lilac blossom.

Pink and purple aquilegias.

This the best photo I have of the hare that has been visiting our garden recently. Back view only!

Woodpigeons having a bath in a puddle in our drive earlier today.

Indoors now. This is my Easter cactus which is just coming into flower. Unlike Christmas cacti these flowers shut during the afternoon and re-open next morning.

Easter cactus flowers.

A Walking Week Part One

05 Mon May 2014

Posted by Clare Pooley in domestic animals, fish, Insects, plants, Rural Diary, trees, Uncategorized, walking, wild birds

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Tags

Adrian Bell, bird-scarer cannon, Blue Tit, buttercup, comfrey, cow parsley, cows, cut-leaved crane's-bill, daisy, fairy ring, field maple, fish, Germander Speedwell, goosegrass, great yellow-cress, greater spotted woodpecker, Greater Stitchwort, greefinch, Hawthorn, Herb-Robert, Lords and Ladies, May, orange-tip butterfly, perch, pineapple weed, pond, red campion, ribwort, sheep, St Mark's fly, stinging nettle, wedding ring, wild rose

I have managed to do a little walking this week and have enjoyed it very much. Monday and Tuesday’s walking was mainly round the shops so doesn’t count as enjoyable walking. For some stupid reason I mistook the time of E’s hair appointment and we arrived in Halesworth an hour early on Monday. E kindly said she was happy to wait for an hour at the hairdressers but I thought she might go mad with boredom so we did the supermarket shopping and then I got more petrol for the car. She then went for her hair appointment and while she was there I called in at the jewellers to see if anything can be done to my wedding ring to stop it cutting into my finger. Twenty years ago we hadn’t thought that my ring would wear away so quickly. Apparently, we chose the wrong ring – a 9 carat D-profile ring – and should have had a round-profile ring and something of a better quality. Well, too late now! This is my wedding ring, bought for me by my husband and blessed at our Marriage Blessing Service. We weren’t able to be married in church as we had both been married before, but we had a beautiful Blessing Service after our Registry Office wedding. The jeweller said either we could buy a new ring or have my one built up which would cost the same as a new ring. A dilemma which we are still thinking about.

Both Monday and Tuesday were mainly cloudy days and no good for drying washing outside so I decorated the inside of the house with wet clothes. I had more shopping to do in Bungay so drove there on Tuesday afternoon and I made my purchases. On the way home I got stuck in a traffic jam! This is quite out of the ordinary, living where we live. The vehicle in front of me was a supermarket delivery van and not much holds them up usually! I couldn’t see what the problem was as these vans are quite wide, so I edged round a bit and saw….

The cows took their time to leave their field and amble down the road to the farmyard. The stockman had a busy time trying to get the cows out of people’s gardens where there were lots of interesting plants and trees to eat. I took the photos with my phone and then enlarged the pictures so the quality isn’t that good.

E asked if we could watch a DVD together during the evening which I thought would be nice but no-one thought to tell my eyes to watch too. As soon as I sat down they became extremely heavy and so I dozed most of the way through the film to the disapproval of my daughter. This is not the first time I have done this.

Wednesday is ‘shopping with mother’ day which went very well as Mum was on top form and we had a real laugh together. The weather on Wednesday was lovely too – a hazy start and then lots of sunshine. When I had had some lunch at home I decided to walk down the lane to take advantage of the bright weather and to see what was to be seen.

Lots of stinging nettles and goosegrass. Goosegrass is a relative of coffee and quinine and has many medicinal uses. At one time the seeds were roasted and used as a coffee substitute and apparently the young shoots are edible and can be cooked in soups as a vegetable. All I know about it is that if I touch it, it brings me out in a rash! The seeds are hooked and stick to hair and clothes – hence the plant’s other name of Cleavers.

Stinging Nettles are very useful, if painful plants too. They can be used for making cloth, food and medicine. My plant book says that the Roman belief that stinging nettles cured rheumatism still persists in Britain. I can say that there is some truth in this as when I am stung on my hands my rheumatic joints there become less painful. I can’t say I would care to roll about in them unclothed as some people recommend!

These are Hawthorn flowers – May blossom. ‘Ne’er cast a clout til May be out’ – either don’t leave off your winter clothes until the end of the month of May, or, don’t leave off your winter clothes until the May blossom is on the trees.

This is the wild rose and already there are large flower buds as you can see. This is early, as the rose usually flowers at the end of May and into June.

A fine crop of old equipment and other rubbish in this field. At the beginning of Adrian Bell’s book ‘Corduroy’ he talks of the Suffolk farmers’ habit of leaving implements in corners of fields or yards covered in nettles until they are needed for some particular function. They are then returned ‘to some out-of-the-way corner, to be a sleeping Gulliver for the grass again’.

These are the boys – male sheep, tups. A bit stinky – sleeping and snoring in the sun. Wandering about having something to eat now and then – not a care in the world.

Common comfrey. In medieval times the roots of this plant were dug up in the spring and grated to produce a sludge which was packed round broken limbs. It hardened to a consistency similar to that of Plaster of Paris.

A view over the fields.

Cut-leaved Crane’s-bill.

Great Yellow-cress.

The lane.

Herb-Robert. In the Middle Ages they believed that a plant showed how it could be used through its colour or shape – the doctrine of signatures. This plant turns a fiery red in autumn so they thought it should be used in the treatment of blood disorders. It has a strange odour and in some places it is known as ‘Stinking Bob’.

Daisies.

Daisies and Germander Speedwell.

Greater Stitchwort.

A Buttercup.

Pineapple Weed.

A female orange-tip butterfly. Note the lovely green-marbled underwing.

The signpost at the end of our lane.

A male orange-tip butterfly. I have been trying for over a week to photograph these fast flying butterflies!

Lords and Ladies. This is specially for Heather! At last these strange plants are flowering here. I have some in my garden but they are hidden by tall grass and difficult to photograph.

Cow and calves.

This is the pond at the side of the lane. I’m not sure what the fish are – perhaps perch? – but we have the same fish in our big pond.

The pond next to the lane.

Field maple leaves and flowers.

A St Mark’s fly. They usually appear about the same time of year as the Feast of St Mark – 25th April.

R and I went out for a walk across the fields when he returned home from his trip to Gloucestershire that evening.

Red Campion and cow-parsley growing at the end of our lane.

A Red Campion flower.

Ribwort flowers – Turkish Caps,

A ‘fairy ring’ caused by toadstools.

A bird-scarer cannon.

More stitchwort.

St Peter’s Washes.

I’ll end with some photos of birds seen in my garden during the past week.

A female Greater-Spotted Woodpecker.

A bluetit.

Male and female Greenfinches

Easter Day

20 Sun Apr 2014

Posted by Clare Pooley in Rural Diary, Uncategorized, wild birds

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Tags

Easter, greater spotted woodpecker

Happy Easter to everyone!

The weather today was much better than forecast. I was woken at 6.00am by really heavy rain and thought at first that that was what we would get all day. Fortunately, this was not the case. We had a few more fairly heavy showers during the morning but the afternoon was dry with a couple of glimpses of the sun. The temperature rose to the dizzy heights of 13 degrees centigrade as well!

Mum always comes to lunch on feast days but as I had to take her to church as well today, cooking the lunch and being able to eat it at lunch-time was going to prove difficult. I got up early and managed to get a lot done by the time I had to leave for church. I was disappointed not to be able to go to church with R and A, who has come home for the weekend, as the 9.30am service was at our church at Rumburgh. When I arrived back home with Mum I found that a lot of work had been done by my dear family and we managed to eat our meal at 2.30pm. I then sat around talking to the family all the afternoon feeling very tired but quite happy. We had all exchanged little Easter gifts earlier. When I was a girl we just had Easter chocolate eggs and sometimes we painted hen’s eggs with food dye. With my girls things are different. A really disliked chocolate when she was little and still doesn’t eat much of it now so I used to get her Easter-themed presents. E also won’t eat Easter eggs (but does like chocolate) so I’ve always got her Easter gifts too.

This is the Easter decoration in our hallway that E did for us (with apologies for the horrible carpet we can’t afford to replace yet!)

We did manage to see a male Greater Spotted Woodpecker on our peanut feeder today.

I will be able to post something longer and better tomorrow I hope.

Maundy Thursday

18 Fri Apr 2014

Posted by Clare Pooley in churches, plants, Rural Diary, Uncategorized, wild birds

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Tags

Flower Fairies books, Jack-by-the-Hedge, Ladies Smock, Maundy Thursday, sparrowhawk, stock dove

I have recently come home from taking my mother to the Maunday Thursday service at her church which I found quite moving. The word Maundy is an Old English word which originally came from the latin word mandatum – mandate/command. This refers to Christ’s command for us to love one-another. On Maundy Thursday the Maundy money (specially minted silver coins) is distributed by the Queen. On Maunday Thursday we commemorate Christ’s Last Supper and His washing of the feet of His disciples, even Judas Escariot’s who was about to betray Him. The service ends with the altar being stripped of all it’s candles and cloths to leave it bare and then a vigil takes place when we pray and meditate. Mum and I didn’t stay for the vigil as she was quite tired and she was concerned that I should get home sooner rather than later. It was her 84th birthday today. I tried to phone her this morning but couldn’t get through as the phone was engaged for ages. Apparently my sister phoned and an old friend from where Mum used to work rang as well. This was pleasing news to me.

My friend H contacted me about my last post and said that she usually calls Cuckoo Flower ‘Ladies Smock’. I also noticed that Mr Tootlepedal mentioned Ladies Smock in his post. I must admit that I usually call this plant Ladies Smock too but I suddenly had doubts about this and didn’t want to give wrong information out. I then looked the plant up in a couple of my wild flower reference books and neither of them said anything about Ladies Smock so I played safe! H also reminded me that Garlic Mustard is know as Jack-by-the-Hedge and we then had an e-mail conversation about The Flower Fairies books from where we got our first knowledge of wild and garden flowers and plants. H thought that the sparrowhawk might also have been responsible for the possible loss of the goslings. The geese are fierce, protective parents and bigger than the hawk but the hawk is extremely fast and, as I have mentioned, there is not much cover round the pond at the moment. So yes, that is another possibility.

I will end with a not particularly good photo of a stock dove. I include it because it shows the lovely iridescent green patch on the neck.

Catching Up

15 Tue Apr 2014

Posted by Clare Pooley in churches, Gardening, Insects, plants, Rural Diary, trees, wild animals, wild birds

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amelanchier, bluebell, cow parsley, cuckoo flower, early spotted orchid, fruit trees, garlic mustard, greylags, Holy Week, honesty, mallards, marsh marigold, pasque flower, rooks, St Lawrence, St Mary Homersfield, stock dove, thrift, tulip, wood pigeon

We spent last week, 5th to 12th April, away in the Lake District staying in a rented cottage with no phone signal and no internet. As I don’t have a smart phone I wasn’t able to send or receive messages or post anything on my blog. It is very nice to be away from home and duty and all other pressures but there is so much catching up to do on one’s return! Lots of e-mails, lots of interesting posts to read and such a lot of housework!! As I am still working my way through two weeks worth of washing and ironing I don’t envisage that this post will be very long – but I may be fooling myself and will ramble on at length as usual!

It took us five and a half hours to get home which wasn’t at all bad as it had taken us over seven hours to get there on the 5th. The roads were dry and it was cool and cloudy – ideal driving conditions. We unpacked and had a hot drink and phoned our mothers. R’s mum was fine but was worried about her new home help who will be coming to her twice a week. Her old help recently retired and mother-in-law doesn’t want or like change. It doesn’t seem fair that at 88 years of age she has to constantly make concessions and put up with unwelcome changes and interference in her way of life. But, if she wants to stay in her own home for as long as possible, that is what she has to do. My mother seemed fine and had had a visit from my brother, who lives in Surrey, on Friday which had pleased her very much. She had not been able to go to church the previous Sunday so my brother was the only person she had seen and spoken to since I had taken her out the Wednesday before that. Nine days with only her cat to talk to! I arranged with her that I would take her to church on Sunday as I knew she wouldn’t want to miss the Palm Sunday service.

R and I then did a tour of the garden and there were some pleasures and a few disappointments. The most noticeable thing was that the goose was no longer on her nest but there was no sign of any goslings. What had happened while we were away? Had the goslings hatched out and subsequently died? Had all the eggs been infertile? In which case wouldn’t we be able to see them still on the nest on the island? Had the goslings hatched out and then been taken off somewhere else after a couple of days? When we first lived in this house that is what the pair of geese did then but after three years they began to stay until the goslings fledged. We had a change of geese nesting on the island last year after a bit of a battle between two or three ganders, so perhaps the new pair don’t feel this is a suitable place to bring up their young. There is still hardly any grass round the pond and we have got rid of all the willow cover on the bank which might be another reason why they didn’t stay. We had no goslings last year either, but we put that down to the terrible weather in the spring and also the goose wasn’t good at sitting on her nest. The goose this year was very good on the nest and only left it twice a day for very short periods and always covered the eggs well with down. We will never know what happened but I would like to think that one year we will get goslings in our garden again.

A lot of damage had been done by rabbits. A hole had been dug at the back of my border against the house.

A number of my plants had been eaten – probably by rabbits perhaps by deer. We did find a dead, fully grown rabbit near R’s flowerbed. It had been dead for a couple of days and R couldn’t see any obvious reason why it had died. No scavenger had fancied eating it either. Moles had been making lots of molehills.

A blackbird had been killed and plucked next to the greenhouse. I have seen a female sparrowhawk flying about a lot since our return, strafing the small birds with fear, so I suspect her or her mate were responsible for the blackbird’s demise.

We were pleased to see that the pear tree was in full blossom.

The greengage and the bullaces had lost nearly all their petals and we hope that we may have a little fruit. The bird cherries were still in full blossom. R decided that he ought to start on the mowing. We have well over an acre of garden and most of it is grass so we have a tractor mower. It is some years old now and makes R infuriated when it keeps blocking up – I think we will be getting a newer better model soon and then I will see R in his element again, racing round the garden, weaving in and out the trees just like at Le Mans!

The rook chicks have hatched out in the rookery as I can hear them squeaking and squawking all day. Here is a rook looking for tasty morsels. Notice its glossy black feathers and feathered breeches. I have included the second photo even though it is blurred as you can see the shape of the beak and the bald scaly skin at the front of the face. The older the rook, the balder the face.

The duck and drake mallard are still happy in the pond at the front of the house. A couple of common crows are also nesting in the trees on the opposite side of the lane. Wood pigeons abound and so do Stock Doves.

Duck and drake Mallard

Wood Pigeon

Stock Dove

The marsh marigold in the big pond is flowering well. The flowers are more than two inches across.

The marsh marigold in the little pond is flowering well too.

I have found a cuckoo flower by the big pond. This flower belongs to the cabbage family but is much nicer than cabbage. John Gerard, the 16th century herbalist said this pretty flower was called cuckoo flower because it blooms ‘for the most part in April and May, when the cuckoo begins to sing her pleasant note without stammering’.

Cow Parsley is coming into flower. In East Anglia it is called Sheep’s Parsley as well, because in olden times this area was a wool producing part of the country. Another name for it is Queen Anne’s Lace which is a lovely name and describes the frothy whiteness of large quantities of the plant along the hedgerows.

Bluebell spikes are just appearing under the crabtree at the front of the house.

The crabapples are also coming into flower. Pasque flowers and Thrift are blooming in my flowerbed.

As are miniature scented tulips. I used to have more colours than this orangey-red but they have gradually disappeared over the years.

The Amelanchier is in flower. It was planted in the garden a few years ago but then got damaged so I dug it up and I’ve tended it in a tub. It will no longer grow to be a tree as I had hoped but will look alright as a shrub. Once it has stopped flowering I will plant it out in the garden again.

An Early Spotted Orchid is coming up in one of the tubs containing jonquils. We are fortunate to have a lot of these orchids in our garden and they like seeding themselves in flower tubs.

One of R’s cacti is in flower in the conservatory.

This is a Bee-fly. It is harmless to humans despite the nasty looking proboscis. Its larvae live as parasitoids in the nests of mining bees.

In driving about during the past few days I have noticed Alexanders and Stitchwort in flower in the hedgerows. I have also seen Orange-tip butterflies flying. The food for their caterpillars is Garlic Mustard, another member of the cabbage family and the only one to smell of garlic.

I found some perennial Honesty at the entrance to one of the farm yards down our lane.

Oil-seed Rape is everywhere this year and is in flower at the moment. We are surrounded by it. We see it to the left of us…

and to the right.

It has a strong distinctive smell both when in flower and when left to set seed. I don’t like it very much and it gives me hay-fever.

It is now Holy Week and we start, on Palm Sunday, by celebrating Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem on a donkey. At Mum’s church we gathered in the church-yard and processed into church carrying our palm crosses. Mum and I enjoyed the service, both having a bit of a cry during a favourite hymn. Poor R went to St John’s church on his own but met our friends there. I went to Compline on my own on Monday night as R had a migraine. (I had woken with a migraine myself early on Sunday morning!). The service was at St Lawrence church but sadly there were only four of us there. As I drove to the church the sun was setting on one side and the almost full moon was rising on the other side of me. The church door was left open during the service and even though the church is up a lane off quite a well-used road the sounds of the few cars driving along it at 8pm faded away and the silence enveloped us. Now and then we heard the evening warning calls of blackbirds and robins but most of the time it was absolutely quiet. St Lawrence church is built on an ancient site. The Romans had a building yard there, I think, and a Roman carved face is set into the wall of the church. The road from which the lane to St Lawrence church turns off is called Stone Street and is a Roman road. If one comes from Halesworth it is known as the Bungay Straight and if one comes from Bungay it is known as the Halesworth Straight. On my way home the sky was apricot on the horizon where the sun had disappeared. Above that the colours changed from yellow to turquoise to dusky blue and the enormous moon was shining brightly. I saw a couple of hares and some tiny rabbits, only about four inches long – probably on their first night above ground.

Tonight R and I went to Compline at St Mary’s Church at Homersfield. Another lovely church which has been in danger of closing for some time. There were eight of us there tonight and the church was lit by lamps and candles as there was no electric light.

As I thought it would, this post has got to be a long one again and I haven’t done all the housework I should have!