Whitish bluebells

About a week ago I went to check on the progress of my two white bluebells. I had marked where they were growing so that they wouldn't get mown down by accident but rabbits and roe deer apparently don't understand human marks because they had been snipped off low down the stem. Hey ho.

Then yesterday I came across some partly white ones in the same area of the garden though not very close to the snipped ones. On closer inspection there were quite a few.

Path to the yarrow patch

This morning, before the rain came, I mowed a path from near the shed to the main yarrow patch and marked it out with posts and a spare length of washing line.















To the left in the photo is the base of the fallen eucalyptus. I checked out its climbing properties for my grandchildren; yep, it'll do.

There is a way up the slope from its low end on the right, or you can climb up from the tree trunk. plenty of tufty grass to hang onto. From the top you can look down the length of the trunk which is good for walking along and jumping off.

Eucalyptus tree trunk

From the top of the root ball you can admire the rhododendron I am calling "Pale Pink Glory" after a similar one in the Shrubs book by Phillips and Rix.

When I tipped the mower in order to brush the underside, a robin came by. It seemed to be finding plenty to eat where the mower had been. Kept an eye on me the whole time.

Sedum under the Golden Cotoneaster

I cut back some of the golden cotoneaster that you can see on the right in the first photo of this blogpost so that the Sedum (Sedum spectabile/Ice Plant) could get some more light and possibly try to flower. There are quite a few shoots of it but the cotoneaster roots and shoots have rather smothered it.

As I was chucking bits on compost heaps I noticed a few tiny red spots on the ground. I think they are Common Eyelash Fungus (Scutellinia scutellata). A new species for the list.

Common Eyelash Fungus

Magnifying loupe is to give a sense of scale

Today's favourite (piece of) dandelion

At the front of the woodshed sticking to a spider web is a dandelion seed twirling and quivering in the air.

"Nearlies"

I came upon a number of "nearly" flowers in the lane and the field yesterday, and upon a surprise.

Water Forgetmenot

Lesser Spearwort

Meadowsweet

Comfrey

Foxtail

Vetchling?

Rowan

Surprise primula

Evidence of an old path

NW side of back garden

When we moved here nine years ago, someone who had lived here in the 1950s and 60s told me there had been a path up the northwest side of the back garden and that her grandfather had grown flowers to the side of it, some of which he sold at market. Other than a dip in the ground and a few old cultivated garden plants, (a pale-flowered fuchsia, some kind of cranesbill, and a sedum), hanging on under bushes, there was little evidence of paths. The garden had been neglected for about three decades and had become very overgrown.

Pale fuchsia

Geranium leaves

Sedum leaves under a Golden Cotoneaster

Bees adore the flowers of the golden cotoneaster.

I rather like them too even when they've fallen off the bush.

Up near the top, where I was clearing spiraea and pruning grey sallow last autumn, the line of the old path became visible, marked by mosses, the original position of the sallow, and bricks.

old path edge

In the photo to the left, where the path turned the corner can be seen. It led, a couple of metres to the right, to a gate in the fence apparently. There's no gate now, nor any evidence of one but I have found various bits of gate ironmongery lower down the garden.

I've also found bricks covered in moss or half buried along the left side of the old path line, including in the ground exposed by the uprooted eucalyptus tree.

I'm not planning to build the path anew but I will see what I can do to encourage the old plants. Trouble is, I also like the golden cotoneaster and the honeysuckle that is trying to grow through it. Last time I exposed the sedum to more sunshine and it flowered, a deer ate the flower. Hey ho. Such is the fate of cultivated flowers at the Boggy Brae. This is part of the reason why I'm now going for wild. Talking of which... 

Cornsalad (Valerianella locusta) made its appearance yesterday and Common Sedge (Carex nigra). They are boggybrae wild plants for 2015 nos 59 & 60 respectively.

Hairy Bitter Cress

Hairy Bitter Cress has a sister plant called Wavy Bitter Cress (Cardamine flexuosa), which I wrote about here. The most important distinguishing features, at least that I can make out, are firstly that Wavy has six stamens and Hairy has four, and secondly that the seed pods of Wavy only grow up to the height of the flowers whereas those of Hairy grow beyond as shown in the photo below.

Hairy Bitter Cress
(Cardamine hirsuta)

The flowers are tiny and always seems to be closed when I come across the plants so determining the number of stamens is a fiddlesome job with fine tweezers under a microscope.

The fruit pedicels of Hairy grow beyond the flowers in part, I think, because they are erect, relatively speaking, whereas they are more spreading in Wavy. The stems of Hairy are straight, relatively speaking too, whereas wavy gets its name from its more wavy stems.

C. hirsuta erect seed pods
and relatively straight stem

In the Boggy Brae garden I found Wavy on April 21 and Hairy just today, May 19.

Hairy Bitter Cress is boggybrae wild plant no.54 for 2015.

Wavy Bitter Cress (Cardamine flexuosa)

Quick edit... probably my best pic of Wavy, showing the "oh so flexuoso" stems:

May Findings

The first buttercup has flowered. This is Creeping Buttercup (Ranunculus repens). Leaves pictured below.

Silvery scales of Lemon-scented Fern
(Oreopteris limbosperma)

An unfurling crozier of Lemon-scented Fern

Slender Rush (Juncus tenuis),
one small step outside the back door,
looking colourful in afternoon light

Fern and bluebell

and today's favourite daisy

I found what I think might be a Wood Pigeon's eggshell at the top of the garden.
And several bunches of small feathers. Whether the two are connected, I don't know.

The Grey Sallow I pruned vigorously in the autumn is fighting back. It might not be as easy as I thought to use this horizontal branch as a garden seat.