NEW APPROACH?

New little hawthorn leaves
and tiny flecks of lichen.
March 25th 2013

I've been having a bit of a crisis. Here am I with two blogs and hardly any posting. Have I lost interest? NO! Am I ailing? NO!

People expect different things from blogs. I don't know what each reader expects when they arrive at Loose and Leafy but it's not a scrap book. There's a point to every post. Which is the rub. I've been out and about and looking at things almost as much as usual but the light has been so low and so many of the days rainy, photographing has been more of a challenge than fun.

But for all that Loose and Leafy is a blog anyone can read, it's also my own record, a kind of index to what I've seen. So if I don't post, I'm missing out. I'll lose my personal thread.

Oyster Thief
(Colpomenia peregrina)
March 14th 2013

SO . . . I'm going to be selfish. There will probably ensue a fleet of random posts. Maybe some will be nothing more than a picture. Bits and bobs are better than silence. Hopefully, this won't be too irritating. If it is . . . you can always give Loose and Leafy a miss for a while and come back when the text is better. On the other hand, you can hang around and, with me, say 'Oh look! There's a duck!'.

This, then, is a catch up with some of the bits. (Bobs will follow.)

When the hedges are dripping and waiting for warmth, one potters off elsewhere - like the seashore.

There have been storms at sea. At one point the cross channel ferry service had to be suspended because waves were too high for the boats to cope. And on shore - huge deposits of seaweed that must have been churned up have been chucked over the sand. Here's an Oyster Thief (Colpomenia peregrina) - a green alga that looks like a bubble. Well, it is a bubble. That's how it gets its name. If it mistakes an oyster for a rock and sticks to it, the air inside can lift them both and they can float away together.

Worm cast at the rear end of a Blow Lug hole.
(Arenicola marina)
About two inches across and high.
March 14th 2013

The tide was out, lug worms were burrowing. They are the moles of the seashore, with the sand and mud excavated from their burrows pushed back in whirls like this. Except these are not endearing little creatures with soft skins and paddle feet - they are fearsome looking worms. Fishermen dig them for bait and I've stopped to chat a couple of times. One day, I'll ask if I can take a photo but they are so disgusting (the worms, not the fishermen!) I feel it would be a bit like stopping and taking photographs of someone who's leg has just been mangled in a machine. Not quite the right thing to do. The ones I've seen (they don't crawl around randomly on the surface, I've only seen them when they've been dug out) have been about seven inches long . . . oh, click the link if you can bear it! Blow lug - Arenicola marina on the Marine Life Information Netowork. (Sorry, they are fascinating. I don't know why I'm being squeamish.)

Hooded Merganser (Lophodytes cucullatus)
March 28th 2013

Another day . . .  head for a fresh-water lake . . . and a famous bird. This individual, I mean. Not its kind in general. It's a Hooded Merganser (Lophodytes cucullatus). When I took the photograph, I didn't know there was anything special about it. I just thought 'Oh, there's a nice duck, I'll take a picture of that.'. Later, I found out it's a North American bird that has been hanging out with tufted duck on Radipole Lake (part of an RSPB reserve) for a few years now. When it first arrived, bird watchers got very excited, thinking it was truly wild and had flown (or floated?) across the Atlantic. It's now thought to be an escapee from a collection. I get the impression that this, for bird people, is a bit of an anti-climax. According to the train spotting approach to bird watching (see-it-and-tick-it) it doesn't 'count'. But I reckon it's still a pretty duck, wherever it came from.

This is a misleading picture.
The coot's feet were much whiter than they seem here.
March 28th 2013

Sometimes, as I've said often before, there's an enormous advantage in not knowing things because whatever you come across is exciting and new. You may remember how bowled over I was when I first noticed Coots' feet. (Coot - Fulica atra.) Apart from their extraordinary shape, I was stunned by their blueness. Yesterday, I was stunned by their whiteness. The blue tint shows more in this picture than seemed to be there in real life. It was the palor which struck me. That and that it was happily slurping up white bird excrement. (I didn't stay to find out whether this was its own or somebody else's - I'd noticed the merganser by then.) So - next task - which you might help me with . . . do coots change the colour of their feet from blue to white in the winter?

And the last of random images from my 'what I've been looking at' post . . . Wall screw-moss (Tortula muralis).

Wall Screw-moss (Tortula muralis). March 28th 2013

Oh, dear. A scrap book post. But that's life in erratic weather.

The Hooded Merganser (and a whole load of coots)

can be found at the RSPB reserve at the Radipole Lake and Reserve 

in Weymouth, Dorset.

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ROUND A ROCK

This morning, it was cold; very cold. The frost was patchy but, when I went down to the sea at around twenty to ten, it was . . . finger chilling cold.

But the light was lovely.

I would usually aim for a little more variety in a post than there will be in this - but I fell in love with the colour and texture of seaweed on one rock.

I've been scrolling through these pictures over and over. I should get bored because they are all of the same thing. But I don't. I don't know why - I just don't!

I hope you like it too.

This little pool on the top of the rock is about two inches across.

And this is the next rock along. Same seaweed - different arrangement; a sort of skirt round the bottom!

While behind me - is the sea; with three Brent Geese swimming in the path of the sun.

I'd like to have taken the rocks home with me. I'd like to have taken the sea!

(But I think I'll need a little more in the way of storage before I'll try that! Indeed, I'd need a world full of garden sheds!)

This post is supported by Argos.

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FIRST OF THE 'ABOUT's - WEYMOUTH

In the last post on Loose and Leafy, I said I would sometimes give you an idea of what South Dorset is like; what people do here, what the shops and houses are like - as well as a better idea of the wider habitat of the plants. It's nice to have a context, I think.

It's really Barbee who, inadvertently, gave me the idea. I've been reading her blog almost from when it started and have seen her beautiful and interesting garden as it goes through its seasons, hearing of how she works and what her garden helpers do to keep it changing and in good order. Occasionally, she has mentioned neighbours but . . . I have begun to wonder what is over her garden wall.

Weymouth Horses live on roundabouts
- and race in circles.

Barbee lives in Kentucky. I know Kentucky is in the U.S.A. but I need a map to show me where. I have a vague idea there are horses in Kentucky but . . . well . . . that's it. I don't know whether there are mountains or forests or a sea line . . . I'd better look at that map! I don't know what its economy is like, its politics, anything.

Of course, those matters are beyond the normal scope of a gardening blog (which hers is) but, nevertheless,  . . . I find myself intrigued.

Therefore, as part of the 'context' for the plants here, I will, from time to time, show you more of what it is like to live this part of England - and I will begin with Weymouth because it is the biggest town in South Dorset. (And 'big', I assure you, is not very large at all!)

* * *

Most people who visit the area in which I take most of the photos for Loose and Leafy would be amazed that plants and trees are its centre of interest. Of those who swell the population of Weymouth from a population of 67,000 to 200,000 during the summer months, very few will be looking dor dandelions.

Dorset is predominantly rural with woods and hills and fields and farms and its coastline is one of the most dramatic in England - but Weymouth itself (the biggest town in the county apart from the conurbations and retirement areas on the Hampshire border to the East) is the kind of stereotype of an English seaside resort one might not expect still to exist - sea and sand and donkey rides and stripey huts on the beach where tourists and holiday makers can buy ice-cream and candyfloss; roundabouts for children and grown-ups alike and small-scale scary rides for the brave.

There are areas of poverty, of course, and, in winter especially (because holiday flats fall empty) people are  drawn here too when they are rootless or troubled, recently released from prison and wondering where to go or with lives wrecked by addiction.- but that is not its most obvious face from outside.

I find crowds difficult and avoid town when the Kite Festival or Carnival or Christmas 'Show Night' (newly named 'Sparkle') fill the streets almost to crammed-up-full point. None the less, Weymouth is an important part of South Dorset - its atmosphere, its reputation and contribution to the regional economy so here, as a 'starter post' is a glimpse of its harbour. (I'm letting you in gently!)

This is the view as you would see it if you were arriving from the English Channel. On the very left, the rowing boat is a ferry for crossing the harbour. (There's a bridge further along.) Straight ahead is the Lifeboat (with the orange top) and the big boat with masts is The Pelican - a training ship.

This is a working harbour. Fishing boats moor further along.

Weymouth has a small commercial port. You can also take a Condor Lines catermaran from here to Jersey and Guernsey in the Channel Islands and to St Malo in France.

Although, as you can see by comparing its size with the terminal, this is a large boat, it is not the largest on this line.

These are the backs of some of the bed and breakfast hotels, facing out onto the harbour. People staying in them are immediately by the scenes in the photos so far but, in a couple of minutes, they can walk to restaurants and pubs beside the harbour and watch the town bridge go up and down so yachts with tall masts can make their way into the inner harbour (or 'marina'). (It lifts just like Tower Bridge in London - only this bridge is VERY much smaller!).

As an anti-social person, I try to avoid the harbour when it is like this; the beach too (which I will introduce in another post, some other time). I like it when cold has driven people away and left sandcastles to the birds

and while most people are watching boats and kites and carnivals and eating ice-creams, I prefer to look at dandelions on the way home.

(Don't worry, the next post will be back to normal - but I thought you might like a glimpse of the 'other side'.)

P.S. - When I went to collect the URL for Barbee's blog, I discovered that, by an extraordinary co-incidence, Barbee has posted about farming in her temperate zone!

A WINTER WALK AND A CUP OF TEA

I don’t know what it is about old brick bridges but they always seem to be running with water. If there isn't water trickling under their arches, they are likely to have damp patches or small streams dripping from the parapet instead. I don’t know where this water comes from. It’s as if the bridges are standing in for mountains. I’m never clear how mountains manage to spout water either.

But the water on this bridge wasn’t being water for long. It was dripping into the undergrowth and fossilising the plants with ice.

This twig, encased in ice, reminds me of a certain kind of pear liqueur. Bottles are tied over small fruits while they are still on the trees. The pears grow inside the glass and the liqueur itself is added when they are ripe and plucked from the trees - bottles and all.

An imprisoned thorn!

Young Alexanders. These ice-ed plants spark connections. This one reminds me of Snow White in her glass case waiting for the Prince to come and thaw her with a kiss.

* * * * *

It was bleak, yesterday afternoon; beautifully bleak.

Strewn on the sand were these tightly closed carnations with small buds. It seemed terribly sad. You can see another stem a little further away.

The beak of this juvenile herring gull (Larus argentatus) caught my eye.

What had caught the eye of the gull was something to eat. It dropped onto the water, bobbed up and down for a few seconds, then spread its massive wings (a herring gull wingspan can be more than five foot!)  hopped into the air, dived back down into the water - and came out with something pinkish in its beak - then off it went. In the picture, it’s getting ready for lift-off.

And, at last, to my destination - the National Trust Van. 

That’s what I call it - "The National Trust Van". The National Trust calls it a “Recruitment and Engagement Vehicle for the National Trust and Jurassic Coast in West Dorset”. These cheerful (though shivering) people who do the recruiting and engaging are called Ben and Caroline.

I’ve been following Ben on Twitter for a while - under the delusion that he’s a cross between a palaeontologist and a botanist and . . . and . . .  that he wanders up and down the coastline imparting wisdom and knowledge about our rocks and wildlife and history. Because his Twitter name is @jurassiccoastin I expected him to be more of a Jurassic expert than a recruiting one. HOWEVER, he and Caroline (recruiters!) were very friendly and invited me into their van for a cup of tea.

And was the tea welcome! The right hand side of my face (which had been facing east for most of my walk) had frozen so I felt a bit awkward at the beginning of our conversation. Meeting new people when it feels as if you’ve just had a tooth extracted and your mouth hasn’t fully recovered from the anaesthetic isn’t . . . isn’t . . . comfortable.

So that was my afternoon; my walk. Completely without a theme - an ordinary-for-round-here kind of walk at the beginning of winter. (I’ve given up calling it ‘autumn’. The leaves have powdered to dust because of the cold and I haven't smelled a bonfire in days.)

* * * * *

To read more about this roving and recruiting and to reach Ben’s blog, click here.