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The mad Englishwoman and her dog are out and about again so that’s where you’ll find me at the moment (‘Mad Englishwoman and Dog’).

Riverbank with wildflowers

 

Ellie in July 2011

Ellie (our dog) has thick fur. In this heat, she pants even when sitting still. So today I took her to our local National Trust park where there’s a river. I don’t normally go there because I meet people and I have to stop and talk to them. I prefer my walks to be solitary.

Ellie gets very excited when she realises where we are stopping. When she sees the river she races in. Unfortunately she doesn’t swim and doesn’t even like the water coming up further than the top of her legs. (I think it’s because she was swept away by a river in flood when a puppy, for which I blame myself.)

We both enjoyed a paddle however and here is a view of the riverbank with wildflowers.

In the centre Purple loosestrife and Tansy (the yellow flower). On the left Yarrow (the white flower) and Himalayan balsam, the latter a foreign invader which has escaped from gardens and is taking over from native flora (don't get me started . . . )

Message for Trish

I've been trying to comment on your blog for weeks but haven't been able to - not sure if it's me or Blogger.

The 'dense beauty' you saw yesterday could be Yarrow, and the yellow plant Fennel, but it's hard to be sure without seeing the leaves.

Bx

And talking of wildness . . .

. . . what could be more lovely than this patch?

Chicory and old farm machinery photographed this morning at the top of the field behind the house:

Wild Greece

There are many things I love about Greece – the stunning scenery, the food, the friendly people, the simple lifestyle, the heat – but as we drove home from the airport on Monday after a two-week holiday on a Greek island I realised that what I love about the country above all is its wildness.

It’s the result I suppose of the terrain – mountainous, rocky and islandy – which makes it hard to travel around and hard to cultivate. It’s maybe also because of the people – they’re a bit wild too; they don’t seem to have our mania for neatness and safety. They don't have to 'improve' things all the time.

Or perhaps the people are the result of the terrain.

Whatevs (as my sister would say), here are some pictures from the holiday.

One of the island's many ruined windmills and ruined houses, just left gracefully crumbling. (Spot the Frog.)

 

A happy goat, with crumbling terrace walls and gnarled olive tree. (I have this picture as my desktop at the moment - it makes me smile every time I see it.)

Chickens, wandering free through the wood

 

There were swallows nesting above the doors and windows of all the shops and tavernas. Here are some at the bakery. At the supermarket they flew around inside and perched on the freezers.

Entish olive

They'd had a late spring, with lots of rain, so there were still wildflowers in abundance (and butterflies of all shapes, sizes and colours).

Fragrant clematis straggling over a wall on the way to the beach

 

Lavender (I think), growing out of rock

An orchid (I think) which suddenly appeared one day beside the road we took to the beach. I saw some others too, different ones, but the wind was blowing so hard that day I couldn't get a proper picture.

Centaury, which carpeted dry ground turning it vivid pink

A plant I'd never seen before but identified as going by the wonderful name of Spiny bear's breech, with wild carrot

A close-up of the striking flowers of Spiny bear's breech

The leaves of Spiny bear's breech. The plant belongs to the Acanthus family and, according to my Mediterranean wildflower book, the leaves of Acanthus species 'are believed to have inspired the decorative foliage on the capitals of Corinthian pillars in classical Greece'. Not being an architectural expert, I can't vouch for that.

Common Blue?

The best way to learn about wild flora and fauna is to have someone point things out to you.

That is the way I learnt about wildflowers. The mother of one of my friends in the village where I was brought up was extremely knowledgeable and took me and my friend for long walks and helped us identify everything we saw. We were doing a wildflower diary as a biology project at the time. My friend got first prize for the project and I got second. I was furious at the time, but it was of course only right.

Unfortunately I’ve never had anyone to help me with birds or butterflies, and I struggle because what I see never looks like the pictures in the books and because the darned creatures move too much.

Here is a little blue butterfly which I see quite a lot of. This morning I managed to capture it on camera and, after a lot of perusal of my books, I have decided that it is the Common Blue.

If you know better, I’d love to hear from you

Seakale

 

The rare Seakale on an East Devon beach last August

Watching BBC2's Springwatch last night (which was on Minsmere RSPB Reserve on the Suffolk coast), I discovered the name of the plant I saw on an East Devon beach last August but couldn’t identify. It’s Seakale.

The plant grows on shingle beaches in the south (mostly) and used to be abundant. You can eat the leaves however and in the eighteenth century became fashionable and was harvested almost to extinction. I feel quite privileged therefore to have seen it.

My two older wildflower books say it flowers June to August, but my newest one (published 2008) says it flowers May to September – a sign of changing climate, I suppose. Another interesting point. (Well, I find it interesting anyway.)