A visit to Glasgow Necropolis

In August last year, Little She Bear and I visited Glasgow Cathedral and we decided that day that one day we would come back and walk up to the necropolis. Yesterday we did that. This pic is taken from the necropolis looking towards the cathedral and Glasgow Royal Infirmary. More of that later but first here are some of the murals we saw on buildings of Strathclyde University as we walked up from the station after alighting form the train and after coffee in George Square in the sunshine.

These two were my favourites, I think, though I liked them all. What a brilliant way to deal with an old brick wall!

Views from high up in the necropolis were great.

The mausoleums were imposing.

And the sky was blue all day!

We enjoyed the plants, including this very sycamore-like acer whose leaves were an unusual colour, the ferns and mare's-tail growing out of cracks between stones...

...the beautiful blossom of
hawthorn and rowan...

...the light through large trees and the hundreds of tiny and not so tiny ash trees growing everywhere. Let's hope that Scotland's ash trees will show some resistance to ash dieback and revive woods throughout the UK in due course.

young ash between monuments

Some of the gated mausoleums were amazing. I took a couple of photos for @GarethsGates.

Then, towards the end of our wander, I spotted this. This Arthur Booth was not my great uncle from Featherstone, who played cricket for Yorkshire during the time when only Yorkshiremen could qualify for that, but it was nice to see the name and be reminded of some family history.

She Bear and I think we will go again some time with notebooks and pencils so that we can write down names we have never come across before. There were some very unusual ones.

But before then we will go on a trip to Dalreoch and do some exploring there. There is a maritime museum there and plenty more history. There is also, I've just discovered, a tea plantation!

Oh! Wait! It seems the tea plantation called Dalreoch is at Dunfermline. Oh well, there's another outing.

Path through azaleas

I re-cut a path through the Rhododendron luteum (azalea) bushes on the front bank this morning; it saves a lot of scrambling up or down and around the bushes. Now I can walk right across the front bank at the same height. I cut back a bit of that old plum tree at the end of the path too, to give more light to the Everlasting Sweetpeas that grow under it.

The easiest way round to the front bank is via the "north-west passage" to the birch tree and turn right. I have to watch my step to avoid the Tormentil and Devil's-bit Scabious plants that grown under the birch, then step up to the azalea level by the birch root steps.

I am surprisingly un-midged!

Individual flowers on a daisy...

...and dust on the microscope lens! Cleaning it is a job for tomorrow.

These are evening daisies so, also tomorrow, I must see if I can find a plant where the tiny petals are open.

This one is very ripe and 'sugary' >>

The one below, slightly less so.

ripe daisy heads

Bluebells, plantains, daisies and more

These are part of a seven-metre long stretch alongside the south-east fence. There are two more large patches and an increasing number of small outliers which I hope will go forth and mutiply.


Yesterday's favourite plantain. I liked the one below too:

Ribwort plantain

Tiny daisy.

This, believe it or not, is a path.
Have to wait till the bugles have finished flowering
before mowing it.

Note: I still use the old name for English bluebells, Endymion non-scriptus, simply because I like it! I'm not sure whether the current name is Hyacinthoides non-scripta or Hyacinthoides non-scriptus. I've seen both in books.

In the garden today

I protected the Sedum telephium from gobbling deer so they ate the Sedum rosea instead, all of it except one flower in a different place from the two main clumps.

Apple blossom has shown up on the old, old apple tree. If it fruits at all, the local jays come and eat the small apples complete with the wee beasties inside them. The branch that's propping the tree up (and has probably rooted where it is) has blossom on it only about 30-40cm above the ground.

Geraniums and Welsh poppies are flowering, and there is more Germander Speedwell than in previous years. I'm happy about that. My Welsh poppies are all orange. All the other (very many!) Welsh poppies that grow on the peninsula where I live are yellow, and those growing from seed I sent to a friend last year are growing yellow too! She wants some orange ones and I want some yellow ones.

The last primroses are in a shady corner, London Pride has begun to flower, there are buds on the heavily pruned Woodshed Rose, and Fringe Cups (Tellima grandiflora) that is growing out of a wall is flowering.

Aquilegia has begun to flower and I'm still trying for the perfect "I walk on daisies as I step out .the door" shot.

Time for tea and some nutty, seedy flapjack that I made this morning, I think.

Two combs

Yesterday my comb snapped. The light coloured one is actually older than the darker one but less used until recently because it fell down the back of a heavy chest of drawers which I only shift very occasionally to get at spider silk and dust. I had started using it again recently because the darker one is getting worn.

I went for wood originally because my hair seems to 'statickify' (!) very easily and I thought wood would limit that tendency. It did.

The tines of the darker comb, as well as wearing down in that characteristic way, are looking less robust in parts too, so I think I'll have to do some comb shopping sooner or later. Did a quick google of wooden combs and was slightly horrified at some of the prices!

Maybe I should go for a reindeer horn one. Check out this research about Viking combs by Steve Ashby at York University.