10 Miles Away….and a bit of a Difference

Yesterday I was full of enthusiasm for the new Spring growth in the woods.  Those new green leaves full of hope that Spring was really here.  Today we are barely 10 miles further south and this woodland does look a little different.

Beech Trees are bare and the woodland doesn’t seem to have shrugged off its winter coat. Celandine provide a yellow carpet indicating that even here spring is on the way…but as yet no Bluebells. The twisted bark of the Sweet Chestnut glows in the morning sunshine and by the Lake the Weeping Willow, always the first to leaf, are starting to show that lime green of spring across their tops.

Winters damage needs to be evaluated and those stone walls repaired as they are much more than just a boundary being home for small mammals, nesting birds and insects and lichen.

Gorse is now in flower and one stand of Horse Chestnut are way ahead of the spring game, their fresh leaves and tall flower spike a beacon in an otherwise bland spring scene.  Larch and Pine do their best to help but for most of the Parkland the trees are bare and skeletal but providing a good indication as to which way the prevailing wind does blow!

Celandine Carpet

Style to nowhere

On the edge of the Parkland there are a group of old building I am always drawn to like a magnet.  These building are the old Deer Shelter.  Built as a location to feed the Deer that roamed this Estate, its principle aim was to attract the Deer to this location, so that they were visible to the owner and guests to the estate from the House. Like many architectural ruins they still want to tell a tale and create an aura of mystery and magic around them…

17th April

(C) David Oakes 2015