Apr 24, 2008

Bluebells abound and swan gangs galore.

In the coppiced woodland here, where the wood anemone was in bloom a month ago, the English bluebells are taking over. It is a beautiful sight to see and it almost seems as if your eyes are playing tricks on you.
They are not even at their peak yet but the woodland is filled with a blue haze, almost as if a fog is creeping in.

Here is the star of the show, well one of the large cast anway, is the English bluebell, Hyacinthoides non-scripta. The foliage emerges first while the wood anemone are still blooming and then there is just an explosion of blue everywhere with it eventually disappearing underground to go dormant for the rest of the year.
The Hornbeams are finally leafing out too!



The wild garlic is also in bloom, Allium ursinium. When the foliage first came out, about 4-5 weeks ago, we would make soup with it. It was really tasty but unfortunately it has a very short season.

On a very warm and sunny day, we went walking on the footpaths along River Rother. There were lots of crop fields that the paths went through with some pretty amazing Oaks. Even though this one is dead it still caught my eye. About 200 feet away were all of these white birds moving around a bit. Turns out there were about 12 white swans that were nesting in the middle of the crop field, just out in the open. When walking on the paths they would crane their heads straight up to see what kind of danger we were to them. I have had some pretty close encounters with swans as a child and know how nasty they could get. I didn't even try to get any closer because I wasn't about to get my butt kicked by a gang of pissed off swans. That would've been a sight to see though. The swans were a surreal sight.The Bluebells again in the evening......