July 6th – On an equally dull return commute, harassed by the threat of an oncoming deluge, I shot along the canal on the way home. Pausing only at the small patch of meadow – less than 100 square feet – at t eh top of the new pond at Clayhanger, I captured these midsummer soldiers: St. John’s Wort and the gorgeous thistle.
Come back sun, and make these soldiers shine!
June 26th – Back near Lower Stonnal, a noxious assault of a different kind…
I was riding back down the lanes and I realised there was a strong farmyard smell, which is unusual there. I travelled some way further and discovered I had been downwind of this: it’s a crop sprinkler spraying liquid slurry on the grass to improve it (I assume the pump is elsewhere).
This is a dairy farm, and they’re using one of the cattle’s most copious products to restore the growth to the pasture.
Nicely circular, but very smelly.
25th June – It’s easy to overlook the weeds and commonest wildflowers, but also a crime. I love dandelions, buttercups and daisies – they’re the unsung, everyday background to many beautiful views. After all, what would a gorgeous summer meadow be without them? Yet how often do we really study these most common of flowers?
I love daisies in particular. Delicate, colourful and hard, they are a real success of the British ecosystem, yet few ever give them a second thought.
Here’s to the common, but unseen.
June 21st – A pleasant ride out to Blithfield Reservoir on a more settled, but no less windy afternoon. I hadn’t been this way for a couple of years and the villages, hamlets and countryside are beautiful.
Blithfield was created in the 1950s to supply water to Stafford. It’s a lovely haven for birds – an the ice cream van at the north end of the causeway still serves the best cones!
June 17th – This is joyous.On the banks of the new pond at Clayhanger, what I believe to be northern marsh orchids growing in profusion. The grass is not cut here, and there must be 40 or so of these beautiful purple flowers. They are doing well, and they’re just gorgeous.
The whole bank running down from the towpath is a carpet of wildflowers, and alive with bugs and bees.
There are usually a few marsh orchids on the towpath up towards Aldridge, but the Canal and River Trust’s ferocious and inflexible mowing schedule means that all the best specimens have this year been shredded to pulp in the name of tidiness.
Let’s hope the mowing zealots don’t spot these…
June 17th – I cycled past the coos of Jockey Meadows at half six. It was clearly knocking off time. It had been raining and everywhere was grey and dismal. But something about these gentle, inquisitive beasts always cheers me up.
Here’s to the coos.
June 7th – I also called at the Church of St John, MArchington Woodlands, at a place called Woodroffes. It’s a gorgeous church clinging to a hillside in the middle of nowhere. It overlooks the Dove Valley and is the most beautiful, peaceful spot.
The meadows were dappled yellow with buttercups, the church was bright in the sunlight, and a distant cricket pitch dozed in the warm afternoon.
It doesn’t get much more English than this.
May 25th – On the Plants Brook/New Hall Valley cycle route NCN 535 just outside Sutton, the colour of the season is creamy white; hawthorn, apple and cow parsley as far as you can see.
If cow parsley wasn’t so prolific, we’d treasure it. It’s gorgeous.
May 7th – I notice that on Jockey Meadows, the pasture field that’s genuinely a water meadow is now staffed by a heard of beef cattle again. About 10 or 12 large animals are browsing the scrub in an effort to maintain it – the cows eat the fast growing plants, and give the slow-growers chance. They also spread the fertile love in the form of cowpats.
Every time I passed them this week, the coos have been far over the other side. Only did I notice when I’d zoomed in that a passing heron was doing his bit too.
March 9th – Early, Jockey Meadows. Still grey and dormant, with no hints of spring yet. The last place to wake up in these parts, it has its own desolate beauty in winter.
The cows that were here last summer are long gone, but their work – the removal of some of the most invasive species, and trimming back the long grass – remains.
It’ll be interesting to see the difference they’ve made when the meadow comes to life in a few weeks.
BrownhillsBob's #365daysofbiking 