August 1st – Passing Grove Hill near Stonnall in the late afternoon sun, I noted that it was surrounded by a fine crop of oilseed rape. Where this had been a sea of vivid yellow in spring, it was now going a soft, golden colour.
The plant is harvested by special equipment, which flays the pod from the tiny, tiny seeds which are black when ripe. These then go for crushing to extract the oil, both for biofuel and cooking.
There’s gold in those tiny, spherical seeds.
July 30th – The ripening is noticeable everywhere. Returning from Shenstone, the fields of wheat and oilseed rape were losing their last vestiges of green; not yet ready to harvest, but well on the way. The golden colour is welcome and is like late summer’s coat; the countryside is replete in golds, beige and dark, dark green.
Also doing well, the bramble fruits – dewberry and blackberry – are turning red, and the parsnips growing at Sandhills look in fine fettle.
Doesn’t look like it was such a bad season, after all.
June 26th – It had caught my eye the morning before – a late flowering crop of oilseed rape in a field also partially spread with crimson poppies, just in the lee of Pipe Hill as one descends down into Lichfield. Today I stopped and took pictures.
I’m not altogether sure what causes this – but it is beautiful, and quite rare. It seems many of the neighbouring fields are displaying a similar effect. Beautiful in the sunlight.
June 8th – From Lichfield, out to Croxall, Edingale, Harlaston and back via Hopwas. The countryside is a riot of colour and biordsong right now. The meadows are stunning with dandeliions and buttercups, oilseed rape in still flowering strongly, and all the fresh foliage glows in the sunshine.
I love the view of the wind turbine from Huddlesford: such a graceful machine.
May 31st – Summer finally here at last. After a week of dreadful, rain-sodden commutes, fraught with stress and delay, this was a real tonic. The rapeseed is still spreading the fluorescent yellow love, and nature rose to the occasion perfectly, with field margins and hedgerows ablaze with colour and resonating to birdsong and beebuzz.
May 24th – After a spin around Stonnall and Shenstone in a rather grim wind, the sunset was nice. Sweeping past hedgerows glowing with cow parsley, bluebells and fields full of oilseed rape, the sky set it all off beautifully. A lovely end to a day of awful weather.
At Sandhills, the polythene covered field has had the plastic removed, and each sheet was nurturing four rows of seedlings beneath. I don’t know what they are, they look a bit like peas. It’ll be fun to watch and see what grows.
May 10th – Spring is still going strong. Delightful flowers speckle the hedgerows, and the oilseed rape isn’t quite out yet on Home Farm near Catshill. Mrs. Swan still dozes the day away, hopefully on a decent clutch of eggs, and apart from the wind and rain (which are admittedly pleasantly warm), one might be convinced winter was finally over…
August 1st – On the corner of Cartersfield Lane and the Lichfield Road, at the foot of Sandhills, a field of Rapeseed has been gently ripening for weeks. Just on the cusp of being ready for harvest, the field looks dead and valueless. However, these tiny black seeds, when crushed, contain the most useful oil.
It’s hard to imagine that a few months ago this field was a fluorescent shade of yellow…
July 21st – A spin out to the Chase, then down on to the Canal through Rugeley and the Trent Valley. The journey out was hurried and rushed, but my descent was more relaxed and enjoyable. At Etchinghill, in Rugeley, I stopped to take a look at this field of rapeseed ripening in the warm sun. Although the pods and seeds have formed, they haven’t ripened yet. When ready, the plants are dead and yellow, and the seeds black. They are, however, already heavy in unsaturated oil. Used for a multitude of culinary purposes, rapeseed has a name-related image problem. Look for canola, or as Walkers Crisps term it, ‘Sunseed oil’. This plant is a brassica, and as such, the seed pods make it unusual.
June 19th – cycling back from Blake Street station, I took a spin up through the backlanes of Litte Aston and Stonnall. There seems to be a bit of a wildflower theme going on at th moment, and when I spotted this patch of poppies growing in a ripening oilseed rape field at Little Aston Forge,I just had to take a picture. In the distance is Shenstone. A lovely view.
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