Snow

 

A brief flurry on Easter Saturday...

Thursday 20th March 2008

For the last couple of weeks the birds have ceased to pick at all the Primulas and some of them are looking at their peak. This waxy looking orange one was new last year. I wonder if it will revert to the standard pink form over the years and, if so, how long it will take.

Monday, 17th March 2008

 


I took the bus into Birkenhead this morning and was cheered by the plentiful Primulas that Wirral Council have been planted around the borough at roadsides – as here at Arrowe Park, on roundabouts and in Hamilton Square.


Hamilton Square dates from 1826 and has the most Grade 1 listed buildings in one place in England, except for Trafalgar Square in London.


The Town Hall – which now serves as the Wirral Museum - was built in 1887 of sandstone taken from Storeton Quarry.


In Hamilton Square is a replica Eleanor Cross. Edward I had ornate crosses like this erected at twelve places where the body of his Queen, Eleanor of Castile, rested on the route to Westminster after her death at Harby in Northamptonshire in 1290.


The grief-stricken Edward ordered that she should be embalmed and her entrails buried at Lincoln Cathedral before her body was carried in a sombre procession to Westminster Abbey. The crosses at Geddington, Hardingstone, and Waltham Cross survive to this day. The last cross on the route was at Charing Cross where a highly imaginative reconstruction of the original 13th Century structure now stands.



Attracted by the primulas in Hamilton Square I saw my first butterfly of the year – a Peacock. I saw my first bumblebee yesterday, at home in Pensby.


This modern obelisk is one of a number which have been erected to mark the boundaries of the Hamilton quarter.


Just by this obelisk are a few young London Plane trees which, at this time of year, can be distinguished by their fruits even when the bark is not obvious.

Sunday 16th March 2008

 

The Christmas Rose (Helleborus niger) has just reached its peak of flowering in time for this year’s early Easter which is next weekend. I don’t know if its the way I treat it but my Christmas Rose is always very straggly and tends to hide its flowers away among its leaves, which themselves lie along the ground. As result I have to lift the flowers up with one hand while photographing them with the other. I’m thinking of putting it in a pot later in the year to see if I can improve its shape next winter. It’s ironic that while all the Easter flowering plants were out in January the Christmas Rose has only now come into its best. My other Hellebore, the Green Hellebore (Helleborus viridis )has yet to flower this year.

We have a super patch of violets under the Lilac tree, a spot where it never gets any sun the whole year round. I would love to be able to glance at a violet and tell which one it is but I have problems galore. Rarely do I manage to be sure of my identification. It does not help that my neuropathy (and smoking) have taken away most of my sense of smell. I’m fairly sure these are Sweet Violets (Viola odorata).


Also known as the Common Violet (which it is not in the North or N Wales where the Common Dog Violet – Viola riviniana - is the common species), Sweet Violet, Common Violet and Garden Violet. It does occur as a garden weed and its location in this lost corner suggests it has arrived there uninvited but nevertheless exceptionally welcome. It is commonly known as Sweet Violet, English Violet, Common Violet, or Garden Violet.