Tag: industrial estate

May 18th – I said last week, somewhat stupidly, that the blossom season was passing. That was completely and utterly wrong – it’s still in full swing.

Not with the brassy, brash cherries, apple and other fruit blossoms that entertained for an all too short period a few weeks back, but with the more subtle blossoms of humbler hedgerow soldiers – in this case hawthorn and rowan.

Both smell remarkable. Both creamy white, but very different. And both rarely deemed worthy of a mention, but criminally overlooked as they’re beautiful, especially close up.

April 18th – Last week I found the lovely pieris flowers I didn’t recognise in Wednesbury, even though as readers Susan Marie Ward, Linda Mason and others pointed out, I’d posted them here before.

The reason I hadn’t recognised them was because I’m used to seeing them with the beautiful bright red foliage they normally develop in early spring, but this year seems very late, and last week there was no hint of it.

Well, now it’s arrived and the result is truly stunning. Pieris – sometimes called fetterbush, rather delightfully – is grown a lot in gardens and in beds on industrial estates and parks.

Little things like this make spring such a wonderful time, I’m so glad it’s finally here.

April 9th – I’ve been passing this rather beautiful white shrub for a week or more now and have absolutely no idea what it is. It’s growing in a clump of cotoneaster in an industrial estate flower bed in Wednesbury. 

In the damp beauty of a misty morning it was absolutely gorgeous. Anyone know what it is?

October 11th – Spotted on the way to work, again on the rich, undisturbed grass of an industrial estate verge, some kind of tricholomo – probably dingy. These medium sized, grey and almost downy toadstools were really pretty in their way and I’ve not seen them before.

Every year seems to throw up new fungi to me. I love to find them and puzzle over what they might be.

March 24th – Passing through Wednesbury, I noticed this bank of daffodils by an industrial estate verge. Now that’s a fine thing and I was very happy to see them, then I noticed that amongst the standard yellow variety, there was white too.

I wonder if that was a happy accident or a genetic mutation? Whatever the cause, a delight to the soul for sure.

November 20th – I passed these pine cones on a roadside path on an industrial estate in Great Bridge. They are the largest I’ve ever seen – almost two inches in diameter and seven to eight inches long, they seem untouched by birds and squirrels. They feel quite heave and dense and wonder if they’re ripe or just premature windfalls from the recent storms.

Fascinating fruits that look almost prehistoric.