Tuesday 14th June 2022, 5.45pm (day 3,946)
Respect the pollinators. This bee was giving our incipient loganberries some care and attention. It had put in a longer working day than me, anyway.
Pollinator at work
Being 42
Life, one day at a time
Tag Archives: plant
First fruit
Friday 10th June 2022, 4.40pm (day 3,942)
Year on year, some photogenic subjects come round: foxgloves make a regular appearance around this time of year for instance. Baby plums or apples. And here, the year’s first wild stawberries, a June staple. Enough for a bowl in the evening, with cream and sugar. Nicer than the watery cultivated version, in my opinion.
Audrey III has landed
Tuesday 10th May 2022, 3.20pm (day 3,911)
I’ve been suspicious before that certain flora depicted on here are in fact versions of ‘Audrey II’, the man-eating alien plant from Little Shop of Horrors. Here’s another one. Of course, the connection is made because the plant in the movie is so well-designed, and takes characteristics of real plants as the basis. But it still works. (It’s a foxglove by the way.)
Spring has sprung
Wednesday 23rd March 2022, 4.55pm (day 3,863)
Spring definitely sprung in Hebden Bridge today. Everyone and everything seems to be stretching out to enjoy the sunshine.
Chard, and rain
Thursday 8th April 2021, 12.20pm (day 3,514)
The baby chard happily grows, waiting inside until things warm up — which going by the weather in the last few days, might be a while yet. I, on the other hand, just wait inside, not feeling like I grew much today, in any sense.
Opportunist
Sunday 8th November 2020, 11.55am (day 3,363)
Not much to do other than look at plants again, and to save having a second ‘autumn colours in the mist’ shot in a row (though the woods looked good once more), let me instead document the reason why one of our gutters was overflowing onto the front step below. A garden cane with a fork taped to the end provided a solution. I bet you’re excited now… There went weekend no. 1 of House Arrest 2.0.
Ragwort
Sunday 16th August 2020, 1.40pm (day 3,279)
Ragwort, or Jacobaea vulgaris, is one of those plants that demonstrate environmental priorities. Its bitter leaves are full of alkaloids and poisonous to horses and cattle, so farmers are supposed to keep it under control and there are acts of Parliament that declare it, by law, a ‘noxious weed’. But apparently horses don’t eat it anyway, as it tastes vile. Meanwhile, it is highly beneficial to pollinating insects: indeed, for some, its their only source of food. So let that ragwort grow, I say. This large clump of it currently flourishes in a field above Hurst Road.
Poetry and plant
Tuesday 11th August 2020, 1.25pm (day 3,274)
The second day in a row with an explicitly circular theme. The scene appeared during my first use of C’s treatment room as a work venue for a few weeks, in which time some changes have indiscernibly happened among the decorations and words to ponder.
Overburdened
Tuesday 4th August 2020, 12.10pm (day 3,267)
A dull day in every sense. Also the last day of life for this chilli plant, which as you can see has put all of its efforts into this single great fruit, and spent itself like the one-hit-wonder pop group. The chilli went today into a very nice curry; and the plant, with our thanks, was put out of its misery.
A one-day bloom
Monday 22nd June 2020, 8.30am (day 3,224)
This squash plant is growing on the window sill of our room. Now I’m no expert on botany, and it is true that one rarely gets the chance to observe flowers in such controlled conditions. But I have never seen a plant that blooms in such an ephemeral way. This flower had not opened at all last night: here is what it looked like at 8.30am. But it was already withering. By 11am it was visibly drooping and by not later than 4pm it had shrivelled away to the state of the one visible behind it — which had done all this two days ago.
I hope it got what it wanted out of its few hours of glory, anyway. You have to hope that evolution still knows how to build things that are fit for purpose.
Being 42 