Tag: flowers

March 4th – A day beset by travel difficulties. Actually, a bloody awful day all around, if I’m honest. I set off on an 8am train to go to Leicester. I didn’t get there, due to signalling issues, until gone 12pm. Hopping off the train in South Wigston, in bright sunshine,resisting the urge to kiss the platform papal-style, the deathly dark mood was suddenly lifted.

Readers who’ve been following this journal a while will recall from last year that I’m fascinated by the flowers that grow, untended, on a patch of embankment at South Wigston Station. All year, this once tended strip of border is a riot of colour. Today, I noticed it had already got it’s spring jacket on.

Yellows and blues were the order of the day. Crocus, forsythia and a small blue flower I think may be hepatica or anemone, but I welcome a positive ID.

I went on my way, my mood lifted. Heaven, in a wild flower.

February 24 – Flowers have again appeared on the miner railings in Brownhills, and I have no idea why. There is no note. They are attached firmly with cable ties, and there are three separate bunches, bundled together. I can’t think of any fatalities here. The wreaths tied here at Christmas were soon cut down and taken away, which I though was rather sad.

Does anyone have any idea what this is all about?

January 30th – Another sign of the season’s wheel inexorably rotating came to my attention tonight. Stopping to attend to a sticking gear cable in Shelfield, on the corner of the verge, just under a hedgerow, something is stirring. Quietly, determinedly, a yellow army is emerging. Using only the power of cellular hydraulic action and the mystical imperative for growth, some celestial trigger has kickstarted spring. Soon, the foot solders will be amongst us, bright, yellow and beautiful.

It’s started now. There’s no going back. This makes me very happy indeed.

September 12th – By the time I was coming back towards Brownhills, the sun was coming out again and blue skies were peeping through. I noticed today the almost total absence of wildflowers on the canal – the flowering season is well and truly over. The leaves are still verdant and lush, but the joy of the wildflowers has ceased, at least for another year. I feel autumn tugging at my coat. This is not good; I’m in that depressing period when I know what’s coming but haven’t adjusted to appreciating it yet. Autumn colour always lifts my spirits, so bring it on…

August 2nd – Telford Station is pretty grim, and currently stuck in some kind of refurbishment hell. I dislike the place, but it has no steps, so by any degree has to be better than Lichfield Trent Valley station, the rectum of British railways. However, one aspect of the station that just keeps on giving is the flower bed on the westbound platform. I don’t know who plants it and tends it, but it’s a delight all year round, and very much appreciated. Gorgeous.

July 23rd – I found myself commuting to Leicester this week. This means an early run to Lichfield Trent Valley, a change at Nuneaton and cycling from South Wigston. This is a journey unique in the British railway system in that it features the two worst stations in the country (apart from possibly Hale and Dovey Junction). However, this year, South Wigston has been a delight. I have no idea who, but someone has been guerilla planting flowers on the scrub on the northbound platform. Earlier in the year it was a riot of grape hyacinths, bluebells and primroses. Now it’s a peculiar but delightful yellow unknown flower, roses, budleia and foxgloves. Beauty in such an unexpected place. It can’t be cultivated, because it’s still just scrub.

July 3rd – Not half a mile from taking the rain sodden, misery-laden pictures in the last entry, a couple of things cheered me up. Cycling is a very effective antidepressant and I almost always finish a ride feeling happier than when I started it. I was cycling down Gravelley Lane towards Lower Stonnall on my way home, and movement on my left caught my eye. Turning to look, there was a young calf frolicking in a field of fresh grass, having an absolute ball, presumably with the rest of her herd, just having been turned out there. I headed for a gap in the hedge to take a picture, but sadly, the view was blocked. I adore cows, they’re so nosey…

Further along the lane I spotted the snapdragons in a field gateway. Antirrhinum are not, I believe, native to the UK, but garden imports from warmer climes (although I could be wrong and feel free to correct me). One often sees them in the countryside at spots where flytippers have dumped garden rubbish, and I suspect these delightful blooms to be of that category. However they got here, they’re gorgeous, and very welcome on such a dull afternoon.

In case you’re wondering, they’re called snapdragons because the flower allegedly looks like a dragon’s head, and if squeezed gently between thumb and forefinger, they open like a mouth.

June 21st – It was another miserable day, but I had managed to avoid the worst of the rain. I thought I’d continue with my wildflower feature, and after yesterday’s thistles, it made me think which other flower buds were interesting. In Thorneyhurst Lane, near Lynn, I spotted this poppy bud. Poppies seem such fragile flowers, yet the buds seem almost prehistoric in nature. The hedgerow and verges here are peppered with these downy buds, and with other poppies in various stages of the flowering cycle. A beautiful flower.

June 11th – Summer’s cauldron continues to simmer. I noticed whist climbing the Black Cock Bridge in Walsall Wood that the wild honeysuckle – or woodbine – I talked about choking the lupins was growing over the guard rails on the souther flank of the bridge. A riot of colour, these gorgeous blooms, when fully open, will smell wonderful. I never thought I’d see such a thing growing wild in this post-industrial landscape.

MAy 7th – I spotted this bright yellow flower at the new pond in Clayhanger. It was growing in very wet, very sandy soil right on the waterline. It was a single, lone example, and I could see none similar. The colour really shouted out in an otherwise dull environment.

Anyone any ideas? It’s rather beautiful, particularly on such a dull, loveless day.