The leaves haven’t really changed yet but this avenue of poplars is lit gold in the midday sun. A tram flashes past on the park boundary head of me, which triggers a feeling that I’m truanting.

Clutching onto summer, my current policy is to stop working whenever the sun comes out and to get outside as quickly as possible. Today I find myself drawn towards South Norwood Country Park, a curious patch of green in south east London.

This forty-seven hectare Local Nature Reserve is formed from what was previously patches of parkland, a sewage farm, allotments, army training grounds and a rubbish tip and was opened in its new guise in 1989. I enjoy reading that some of the older residents still refer to it as the sewage farm.

As well as being a popular site for birdwatchers, for a plant enthusiast like myself this suburban green space has some interesting things to offer. While a number of the drainage ditches have unsatisfying concrete walls I find a variety of aquatic plants in a more natural ditch and wade in to collect samples to take home to identify.

After scrambling clumsily out of the ditch, I notice deep pink spikes in the shade of an oak tree, I think is a garden escapee, Red Bistort (Persicaria amplexicaulis), a relative of our native bistorts and later I’m pleased to see this is on the plant list for the park.

I find two plants in the carrot family still in flower, Hogweed, with its glorious half globe flower heads, and another one I can’t identify. I take a small sample for a nice distracting puzzle to take on when I get home. I love this flower family and spend some time taking macro photos of the flowers.

With great timing there’s a sprinkle of raindrops just at the point I really must get back to work.