April 3rd – Too rushed to take many photos today, but pulled up short by a flash of cerise in the Clayhanger hedgerow – blackcurrant blossom. Always beautiful, mostly overlooked.
On a grim, cold and windy day a real fillip.
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April 1st – It’s the 8th birthday of this blog today – on April 1st, 2011 I started by joining the #30daysofbiking project egged on by Renee Van Bar, top cyclist, pal and Dutchperson. I enjoyed it so much, the only thing that ever stopped me riding was a very bad case of food poisoning at New Year 2012. Apart from those lost 2 days, I’ve cycled every day since then.
That’s cycling for 2,920 days out of the last 2,922.
I’m quite pleased with that. When I tell the #30daysofbiking people about this they always treat me like some kind of oddity.
Every day I get on my bike and ride somewhere, and take you readers along with me. Thanks for joining me and sharing my journeys, be they work, errands or pleasure.
And what better time to mark this achievement than to note the fresh white beam leaves of a new year? Gorgeous in their ridged perfection, they are beautiful and I was pleased to see them near Clayhanger Common.
Cone on then, grab your coat – I’m up for another year of this. Are you? Hop on.
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March 26th – A full three weeks earlier than last year, the cherry blossom is coming out on the industrial estate where I work.
Returning from Telford at lunchtime, I noticed the pinky white flowers catching the sunlight. Then I looked around, and all the other ornamental cherries on the estate that I could see were flowering similarly.
Against the fine china blue sky it was a wonderful, uplifting sight.
This spring is early, but I’m not complaining about that at all! I just wish it would warm up a little now.
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March 15th – One of the nicer, more beautiful and sadly neglected flowers of the spring is the pussy willow. I spotted this one as dusk fell on the Chester Road near Shire Oak.
These complex, pretty catkins start as grey, furry buds and change as they bloom fully to a bright yellow green bay of stamen filaments which are actually fascinating when you look close up.
Sadly, not many folk ever seem to notice…
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February 28th – Also out early and brightening a very grey day in Telford – the blackthorn.
Often mistaken for hawthorn, this harbinger of spring looks almost like a heavy frost or snow, but is actually tiny white blossoms, and they line the motorway embankment as seen from the Priorslee footbridge.
A lovely sight on a grey morning.
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February 28th – Remarkably, still just February and the hawthorn hedges and scrub have new leaves, looking lovely in the rain. Last year this was a whole month later.
Hawthorn leaves when fresh like this are really tasty to chew.
I’m so pleased for an early end to the winter like this – even if this pleasant spell ends soon, it’s been refreshing, like recharging the batteries.
The light and warm days cannot be far away now.
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February 19th – The feisty little robin that a spotted a couple of weeks ago in the treetops near the embankment by Scarborough Road canal bridge in Pleck, Walsall is still singing his heart out and battling for his territory.
I love how determined he is. Nothing stops him singing for long. He’s on a mission.
I hope he finds a mate soon, because he’s certainly earned one!
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February 14th – Unexpectedly encountered on a Telford cycleway, this hedgerow blossom. It’s lovely, crazy white, and almost insubstantially thin, like apple blossom.
I have no idea what it is. the tree is certainly flowering before its leaves have grown.
Don’t think I’ve ever seen this before, but the tree isn’t alone in its flowery beauty; so it’s not just an aberration.
Speckled with water droplets from the quite thick mist, this was a beautiful and unexpected delight.
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February 4th – I’ve always been puzzled why it might be that some deciduous trees don’t shed their dead leaves in autumn; the summer growth dies and goes brown, but doesn’t drop.
Someone asked the same question on social media over the weekend, so I thought I’d look into it.
The characteristic is called marcescence, and is exhibited mainly by oak, beech and hornbeam in the UK. It’s not clear what the evolutionary purpose of this curious feature is; it could be to shelter leaf buds from browsing animals like deer, and indeed, some oaks are only marcescent on lower boughs. Another theory says that the leaves attached to the beaches have their goodness absorbed back into the tree over winter, which is more efficient than them dropping and relying on conversion from leaf litter.
So I’m not really much wiser, but at least it has a name – and this marcescant oak was showing it’s dead leaves well beside the cycleway in Telford as I passed this morning, making me smile.
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January 17th – Signs of spring continue to seep into my daily commute.
On a bright, sunny, blue-sky morning fresh, alder catkins are growing, ready for spring next to last year’s fruit – female catkins which grow to become Coe-shaped and release seeds in winter, in the same was as pine cones.
Catkins are some of the first tree blooms of spring, and always a welcome sight.
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BrownhillsBob's #365daysofbiking 