July 4th – Also out, but altogether busier was this juvenile heron. A lovely bird, clearly maturing and in very good condition, although still small for an adult.
This is a healthy, native heron fishing in a waterlily-swathed canal in the shadow of a huge scrapyard in the heart of the industrial Black Country.
Tell me this place isn’t wonderful and surprising. I dare you.
July 4th – It was a day of cats. Cats everywhere. Strolling, taking the air. Sleeping, lounging, supervising, watching. These are just a selection of the lovely pusses I met out and about on my commute.
Stripes was lounging under a car in Birchills, and was annoyed because I caught him washing his bum, legs asplay. Ginger was snoozing, half asleep in the shrubs near Catshill Junction, and is a cat I’ve seen many times. The pair of flat out sleepers? The same pair of sleepyheads I saw last week in Scarborough Road, Pleck, presumably waiting for their staff to return home.
Presumably the lack of sun but general still warmth encouraged these lazybones out today. It was wonderful to meet them.
July 3rd – It’s time for my annual heart-wrenching over the purple conundrum that is the butterfly bush. Buddleia is a prolific, very common shrub that will grow anywhere, in any scrap of earth or soot, and is synonymous with urban decay: look upwards in any town right now and you’ll see this tenacious battler growing and flowering from cracks in brickwork, lifting tiles on roofs, blocking gutters, prizing apart chimneys and crowding any embankment, towpath, disused rail line or wasteground.
It’s beautiful and very good not just for Lepidoptera, but all manner of bugs and is very, very pretty. But it is such a symbol of dereliction and decay.
July 2nd – Out on a long ride I was sad to note that the Meynell Ingram Arms in Hoar Cross – refurbished at huge cost after a previous closure – is still empty and gently decaying.
I thought it had closed relatively recently, but it closed without explanation in 2014, and has been vacant ever since. The last refurbishment was extensive, and must have cost a lot: outdoor ‘dining pods’ and other gimmicks apparently failed to pull the punters when perhaps more concentration on service and quality would have been more beneficial. A look at Tripadvisor is informative.
The establishment has had a chequered history and it’s current ownership and any plans for it are unknown.
This is a lovely country pub in a beautiful valley that would make an ideal real ale house with decent, basic food, and it’s so sad it can’t find an owner who loves it.
A real shame.
July 1st – This is just wonderful. I spotted it a couple of weeks ago but I couldn’t stop to photograph it. Outside a recently well-renovated house on the A461, a new house sign lovingly and beautifully made in the image of the house.
Just look at the detail in that, the tiles on the roof. Its wonderful.
My compliments to the householder, and huge respect for the craft and skill of whoever created this wonderful curiosity.
June 30th – Spotted near Wednesbury, this lovely black cat that I’m sure a passing witch must have left behind. Prowling the perimeter of it’s territory, it peered at me cautiously before settling down to stare me out through the railings.
A lovely puss that clearly takes security duties very seriously indeed!
June 29th – Returning in steady, not unpleasant drizzle through Wednesbury, I spotted what once was a local wildflower rarity, on the grass verges round the Parkway Island subway system: Self-Heal.
This pretty little purple flower – it really is tiny, and easily mistaken for clover – is edible and a tradition salve for irritated skin. Spotted with fine rain, it was a beautiful and lovely find on a dull journey.
June 28th – One of the plants that’s commonly considered a nuisance and confined to edge lands and waste ground is rose bay willowherb, or old man’s beard.I’ve always felt the scorn for this violet midsummer trooper was unfair, as it’s another beautiful weed.
Fast growing with well-recognised wind-borne seeds, this tall plant is seen in hedgerows and other land that goes untended. It has a beautiful smell and adds a lovely purple tinge to otherwise dull spaces.
I’ll get you all looking at your weeds in a new light if it kills me…
June 28th – A miserable wet day, but thankfully, I mostly managed to avoid the worst of the rain. Although not great for me, it’ll be good to swell the rapidly growing fruits by the wayside.
How quickly we move to the fruiting phase of summer: Rowan berries, cherries, haws and all manner of delights are now developing steadily and beginning to ripen.
A genuine delight on a dreadful morning, but where the hell is summer slipping away to?
June 27th – Another beautiful weed is the thistle. There seems to be a very large variety of these spiny, prehistoric looking plants, and their strains seem endlessly complex – but whether a light mauve like these at Shire Oak Hill or a pink or deep, deep purple, they are all gorgeous and fascinating, particularly in the hostel-looking buds.
BrownhillsBob's #365daysofbiking 