July 15th – Another joy of warm summer rides is the overspray from crop sprinklers. Often placed – sometimes I wonder if somewhat mischievously – so they spray into adjoining lanes, cycling through the cold mist is a delight.
Sometimes, it you can’t get caught by one directly, standing downwind can be just as rewarding.
Or maybe, just maybe, if the sun is shining, you can catch a perfect little rainbow…
September 18th – I have no idea about this, as I’m no meteorologist and I know even less about cloud formations, but I can’t recall ever seeing stripy cloud like this before.
It persisted for some time around 5pm over east Staffordshire, and was quite beautiful – when most pronounced, it had a very shard ‘edge’ to it which was fascinating in itself.
Can anyone tell me what this is all about, please? How rare is it? Does it have a name?
July 22nd – Lots of this gorgeous purple flower about at the moment, chiefly in ditches and damp areas. At first I thought it was an orchid of some sort, but thanks to help from twitter, it turns out to be purple loosestrife.
It’s gorgeous, and there’s lots of it this year, complimenting the foxgloves, buddleia and willow herb beautifully.
Purple really is the colour of high summer…
February 19th – Here at Whitemoor Haye, near Alrewas, there’s an example of a hidden menace stalking Britain’s crops, but it’s rarely mentioned. Everyone loves swans, the graceful, beautiful white birds that populate rivers, canals and parks. However, they have a darker side. Aggressive and voracious of appetite, these large birds with no real natural enemy are multiplying in number at a huge rate. In spring, they gather in huge groups – this is just a tiny one – on fields of very young crops, then proceed to decimate them. Swans love the green shoots of fresh growth, and will gather on any flat field. Farmers will zigzag tape barriers over crops to prevent the hungry birds from landing, but success is limited. After all, you can’t be unkind to such gorgeous birds, can you?
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