Public Service Announcement

I’ve been out to check and it’s still horrible. Shelter in place until further notice.

We had a tantalisingly sunny day earlier in the week. It had started overcast but by the time Lyra and I hit the trail patches of blue were visible so a skip around the riverside was in order. As we marched out a black tribe was gathering, moving forward, tree to tree ahead of us. “It’s a murder” I declared in my best Taggart accent. Mum, an avid consumer of gruesome crime fiction, looked up enthusiastically, “whereabout?”. I’ll swear she was slightly disappointed when I gestured to the festival of crows in the willows, enough, I suggested, much to my own amusement, to qualify as a mass murder. She snorted – I suspect crime tape would have been more appealing. There wasn’t much river life abroad, perhaps the current, still high and fast after all the recent rain, was keeping them away Mum suggested, making Cassandra like predictions about the fate of any ground nesters. I smiled to myself when I later noticed two unusually sensible oyster catchers darting in and out of a tethered fishing boat. We counted two sulky cormorants in the lower branches of a sunken tree and a suspected heron (too right-angled to be a carrier bag) and that was the sum total of our nature dudery for for the day. Nonetheless, it felt like a success. By the end of the walk both Mum and I had concluded that the third sweater was proving a bit of a liability. Jackets were unzipped…Lyra had even ventured a two paw dabble by the rivers edge. My hopes began to rise and after a giant wedge of post walk cake I was out in the garden (no recipe yet – I think it still needs a bit of work (too sweet) though Keith (mouth full of cake) disagrees). On a yomp around the fields the next day there was much tweeting and twittering in the hedgerow and, again, I found myself thinking that spring might really be happening after all. More cake then I was back out with the barrow….

Out in the garden aconites are shining merrily all over the back track and there are huge drifts of snow drops in the shade garden and the library bed, with adventurous clumps moving out across the back lawns. Here and there there are vibrant pops of magenta from cyclamen coum which I’m hoping will naturalise. The Hellebore are really getting into their swing now and I’m snipping the old leaves off in barrow loads to let the flowers have their day in the sun. (As ever they’ve seeded everywhere and if anyone wants a few just drop me a message. ) One excitement is the discovery that the Persian ironwood tree has dark raspberry pink tassels. I’ve never notice them before! Spotting these made me dash up to the hot garden to check whether the witch hazel there is in flower and it is. I definitely need more witch hazel…..The first of the species iris, blue ones in the library bed, have flowered so as soon as the rain stops I shall have to tear round looking to see if any others have emerged elsewhere.

The alert will have noticed the mention of rain. Yes, two half nice days was our lot. It has been increasingly murky since. A further trip around the riverside left Lyra caked in mud and in need of Mum’s spare towels (though, curiously it was a much better day for birds and we counted 4 pairs of egret as well as spotting the smug oystercatchers flying in and out of their floating home). Things culminated today in siling rain and an extremely soggy dog walk along the back lanes (which are turning into canals at the corners). The garden is going to have to wait for a bit I think – I have started a new jumper and Auntie Lois has sent me a bag of leftover crewel wool so I’m putting another log on the fire…..