Week 9

Spurge, winter honeysuckle and the first wild garlic

Hello! I’ve been a bit laid up this chilly week - a light cold and then back pain caused by trying to work in bed while I had the cold! Doh… So I haven’t been out and about much and don’t have quite as much to say for myself as usual. Luckily you do though! so let’s dive straight into your Week 8 comments, after the usual reminder of what this weekly post is all about: I tell you three seasonal things I have noticed this week, then you tell me yours in the comments. And I start each week with a compilation of your comments from the week before. This week I’m splitting your Week 8 comments into three sections, for one week only! All will become apparent…here we go:

London skylarks; cramming supermarket daffodils into jars and vases; organising a workshop for this LGBT+ History Month; several first curlews heard; a branch of deep pink blossom slowly unfurling in a vase on the desk; Jupiter and Venus with the crescent moon; wild Essex plum trees in full bloom; the pure joy of seeing a wee tomato shoot, shyly coming up from its tray on top of the chest of drawers; a sunset blackbird singing his heart out; snow labelled by a local meteorologist as ‘three times fluffier than usual’; holding a newly woken Peacock butterfly as it revved up its wings, its flight muscles shaking; first chilli seedlings appearing; the Ash Wednesday “ashing” ritual in the little local church; crystal clear water and warm sunshine in the Mediterranean; inspecting buds; pulmonaria flowers opening and awaiting hairy-footed bees; a jelly pit of frogspawn, tiny frog's heads poking out of it; windowsills bursting with trays and pots; spring cleaning; lambs in the fields; snow on the beach in California; about 50 sandhill cranes returning to Wisconsin from their wintering grounds in Florida, circling above, their trumpet calls like prehistoric birds, ancient and wild.

And part 2, I thought we should have a brief ‘Shrove Tuesday’ round up of pancake toppings and other delights:

Making semlor; eating 'Fasnetsküchle' (a traditional pastry of fried dough and cinnamon sugar from the region of southwestern Germany); pancakes at every meal - bacon, tomato and avocado/mayo then chicken peppers leek and grated cheese and later ham and cheese followed by banana/chocolate and vanilla yogurt; banana, Cointreau and Nutella but best of all, sugar and lemon; nutty-flavoured buckwheat galettes with ham, cheese and an egg on top, briefly baked under the grill after the requisite folding to cook the egg; more buckwheat galettes, this time with Emmenthal; fresh maple syrup in Ohio, brought through the snow (Ed: this last one wins Comment of the Week, of course)

And finally, part 3, we have two bits of seasonal news from the southern hemisphere!:

Tropical summer electrical storms that have momentarily taken the sting out of the humidity that assaults in February; white blossoms on the gum trees - the local traditional owners of the land here in Perth -the Whadjuk Noongar people - call this season Bunuru and it’s the hottest time of the year. Bunuru is signified by this blossom.

Absolutely wonderful! Thank you.

Here’s mine, extremely brief, forgive me:

Euphorbia wulfenii

This is a bed at the park and it is suddenly entirely acid green, with Helleborus foeditus blooming as well

Winter honeysuckle

This has been flowering on and off all through winter but suddenly has really burst into fragrant flower. It can’t be the warmth as it’s been pretty cold this week. Maybe the light.

The first shoots of wild garlic

I cannot tell you how I have been scouring the woodland floor for this. I wasn’t even sure that this was it, but bending and picking and sniffing and…yeah that’s it. Unmistakable. Very soon indeed this will look much more impressive, but I was delighted to catch it just as it poked its head above the ground.

Before I go, remember that on Sunday we have our regular chat in the ‘chat’ part of the Sunstack app with your pictures from the week just passed, and it being the first Sunday of the month I would love to see your ‘usual spot’ to see how/if it has changed. If you haven’t joined in before, don’t be shy, you just have to pick a spot and photograph it once a month to show how it changes through the seasons.

That’s it from me. Do let me know what you have spotted/eaten/smelt/done this week that feels particularly…this week.