In our afternoon break at Benslow we had a walk around the garden, but didn’t manage to spot any of the local black squirrels. However there were blackcaps and chiffchaffs singing, along with robin, wren and goldcrests. I spent a few minutes watching a couple of magpies and got a reasonable photo of one of them on the roof of the house. Meanwhile Brenda was busy identifying quite a few new flowers…..
Brenda writes: “It’s always great to be back at Benslow. During the year I visit four times and am always keen to check out what is flowering. Sadly the lords and ladies which was in leaf last time has been and gone, but I did see a solitary yellow archangel flower and there was a primrose still in bloom. I added another sorrel to my list today, common sorrel, which is slender with arrow-shaped leaves.
There was also a new vetch, bush vetch, which has clusters of purple flowers on the stem, and another poppy – long-headed – which has paler red flowers than common poppy but gets its name from the shape of the pod in the middle of the flower which is longer than it is wide.
This project is making me more aware of family groups, and today I had three members of the rose family – salad burnet, wild strawberry and wood avens. These with meadow buttercup make eight new species. Not a bad haul for the day.
The deadly nightshade is looking good with multiple flower heads. If it stays sunny I hope one or two will be open by Monday.”
New species for May 20th:
Flowers: meadow buttercup, salad burnet, common sorrel, long-headed poppy, bush vetch, yellow archangel, wild strawberry, wood avens (herb bennet)
TOTALS TO DATE:
Birds = 191
Moths = 51
Wildflowers = 102