Goat willow or sallow catkins

When the catkins of the Goat Willow or Sallow (Salix caprea) first start to open they have characteristics that remind me of insects. This small tree is one of the "spring willows" that bear flowers before the leaves have appeared, usually in March. It gets one of its names from the leaves being a favourite food of the domestic goat. "Summer willows" bloom later, at the time of, or after, coming into leaf, and include the crack willow and the white willow.

photos © T. Boughen     Camera: Olympus OMD E-M10

Berberis buds

One of the March-flowering shrubs of our garden is the Barberry (Berberis darwinii), an evergreen with prickly leaves. It is a plant that requires annual pruning and those leaves have to be handled with care. However, the local house sparrows don't mind the prickles and can regularly be seen sheltering in the bush, indifferent to people passing close by. The photograph was taken before the flowers opened, and the buds were making a fine display, almost looking like berries.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Olympus OMD E-M10

Coracles in Hereford

Quite by chance, as we wandered around Hereford, we came upon a pair of coracles. They were on what remains of the moat of Hereford Castle. Coracles are small boats, rounded in shape and paddled with a single oar by the occupant. They were noted by Julius Caesar when he first arrived in Britain, probably pre-dated him here, and remained in use for fishing until the middle of the twentieth century.

Today they are sometimes used, in small numbers, recreationally, on the River Wye in England and Wales, and elsewhere. One of their virtues is that they can easily be carried by one person, as shown in this C19 photograph taken in Ross on Wye.

photos © T. Boughen     Camera: Olympus OMD E-M10

Preaching cross, Hereford

The Blackfriars, i.e. the Dominican Order, were given a site outside the Widemarsh Gate of Hereford in 1246. They built a monastery there and, in the 1300s erected a preaching cross to be used to preach to the local population. It is 6-sided with four steps, buttresses, tracery, vaulting, a cross on a column, and is made of local sandstone. Though restored it contains a significant amount of original work. It is the only remaining example of a friars' preaching cross in England.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Olympus OMD E-M10

Former Cottage Hospital, Ledbury

click photo to enlarge
The former Cottage Hospital on The Homend, Ledbury, is a brick and half-timbered building: not proper timber framing, but decorative, in the gables and porch only. It is the work of the architect Henry Haddon and was built in 1891. The effect he sought was a slightly picturesque asymmetry. Today it appears to be divided into separate dwellings. Of itself it isn't much of a photograph, but with its magnolia tree in blossom it is a real eye-catcher. The magnolia flowered early this year: my photograph was taken on 14th March. When passed it again on 22nd most of its blossom had fallen.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Nikon Z 5

Crypt entrance, Hereford Cathedral

At Hereford Cathedral the C13 Lady Chapel was built over a crypt. Both of these spaces are characterised by lancet arches in the Early English style, and they are two of the most interesting features of the cathedral. Entry to the crypt is by quite steep stairs and a door (see lower left of second photograph).

photos © T. Boughen     Camera: iPhone

Litter bin robin

Robins actively seek out human company it seems. But, like most animals it only does so in the hope that it will result in some food coming its way. This robin was flitting to and fro, in and out of the slots of a litter bin, but wasn't looking for food. It had its eye on us and it let us approach quite closely before concluding that we had nothing to offer and it might have better luck elsewhere.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Olympus OMD E-M10

Kitchen garden path

English country houses generally have three types of garden. The best known is the landscape garden, the remodelling and improvement of the middle distance and far distance landscape by, for example, creating lakes, planting trees in clumps and as individuals, and adding "eye catchers" such as classical temples, Romantic ruins and interesting follies. Then there is the formal garden that can be seen from the house windows and when walked through. It will have plants, shrubs and small trees, all arranged in beds that frequently organised geometrically. Then, usually hidden behind a tall wall all around, there is the the kitchen garden where vegetables and fruit are grown for the table of the owners. This may have small workshops and glass houses to enable tender and non-native foods to be grown. Today's photograph shows part of the kitchen garden at Croft Castle, Herefordshire. The rustic path is made of bricks, pebbles and tiles, and on either side, with name tags dangling from them, are different kinds of apple trees.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Nikon Z 5

Fog at Croft Castle

There was a familiar tale recently - the weather forecaster said unbroken sun but we, the weather observers, saw nothing but fog (until the afternoon). Consequently our day out at Croft Castle produced photographs that I hadn't imagined. For much of the time the details of the building's facade were lost and it became a monochromatic, looming pile.

Only when we walked round to the terrace on the south side did we see something of the structure we recognised.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Nikon Z 5

Camellia bloom

People with little interest in gardening frequently mistake the Camellia for a rose. There are some similarities: the flower is like the red/pink roses and its petals are somewhat similar. The strong, shiny leaves can remind one of roses that have foliage of that sort. However, the Camellia flowers early in spring when most self-respecting roses are dormant. In fact, the Camellia's flowers are often damaged by early frost. That has happened this year when many have flowered a full four weeks earlier than usual.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Nikon Z 5

Exodus

It is quite common to find a Bible on a lectern in a church - chapters and verses are often read weekly as part of a sermon. And even where that frequency doesn't prevail a lectern looks empty without a Bible on it and so one is frequently placed there simply to make the place look "right". The chosen version of the Bible is often one of the C20 editions. Where that isn't the case, the King James version is often to be found, and this can be Bible of great age, commonly dating from the C19. The photograph above is just such a version. We came upon it open at the book of Exodus, its great weight comfortably held on a solid wooden support.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Nikon Z 5

Dockside crane and tracks

Gloucester Docks and the adjacent shopping attraction, Gloucester Quays, are an interesting mixture of the old and the new. The warehouses and the water of the docks attract people who want to know more about the area's past. To help kindle the atmosphere a few old cranes are parked where once they would have busily shifted goods from dockside to ship and vice versa. The tracks set in the tough granite setts make a good foreground for one of the most interesting cranes.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Nikon Z 5

Quince

The first time I saw quince in flower and subsequently in fruit was when visiting our oldest son at Oxford University. It was growing against the sunny wall below a window. I knew of the quince because it was the fruit eaten, sliced, with a runcible spoon, by the owl and the pussycat in Edward Lear's poem of the same name. As we have moved, over the years, from the north of England to the south west of the country, we have seen more quince, in flower and in fruit, due to the more equable climate. The quince above, a flowering variety (Chaenomeles japonica), was in full flower in Herefordshire in the last week of February, the blooms appearing before the leaves, a mass of red growing on a fence.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Nikon D5300

Trailing euphorbia

The euphorbia, with a genus of over 2000 members, is one of the largest genera of flowering plants. From tiny annuals to a tree-like plant of 30m (98 feet) or more, one euphorbia can look quite different from another. The subject of my photograph is Euphorbia myersinites,  a trailing plant often found on rockeries in Britain. Like all its brethren this plant has a poisonous, milky sap that can cause a rash on the hands of a careless gardener. I have featured a Euphorbia on the blog before. It shares little in appearance with the example above.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Olympus OMD E-M10

Wet weather semi-abstract

It was a wetter than usual January and February and photography was somewhat curtailed. However, the rain itself added to the appeal of some subjects and today's photograph exemplifies this. It shows the blue painted slats of a bench in a public garden. No good for sitting on after a recent shower, but the water droplets offered the opportunity for a semi-abstract composition.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Olympus OMD E-M10

Crumpled aluminium foil

Sitting on a fallen branch in the Forest of Dean, eating a sandwich, I stopped thinking about yellow brain fungus and started noticing the way the light reflected from the crumpled aluminium foil that had been my food's wrapping. I was carrying the wrong camera for a closeup so I made a mental note to photograph the foil at home. My first effort was taken during indoor daylight and the result was underwhelming. So I tried again under the warm bulb of my desk lamp and I was much happier with it.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Olympus OMD E-M10