Maybe I’m obsessing a bit about sedges and rushes at the moment but I risk a trip in half-term to the London Wetland Centre to see what else I can find. I have to fight my way through families to escape into the quieter Wildside where I find what I think are the last few […]

I’m itching for a botanical adventure this morning and set off for Bushy Park in far distant west London. My mission is simple; to soak up some sun and look for rushes and sedges. Like Richmond Park, Bushy Park is home to free-roaming deer, but as soon as I’m through the entrance I sense they […]

A pal of mine Jane wrote a great piece recently in which she talks about the smell of ivy flowers making her think about ivy bees. I’m not sure if it’s good or bad that I haven’t yet seen ivy bees in Sydenham Hill Wood. The nature jury’s out on what this fairly new arrival […]

I’m hiding behind an ancient oak tree. It’s all gone very quiet. Then I hear a low grunt and when I peek round, five metres away on the other side of the trunk a red deer stag is carefully lowering himself into the bracken. He sits gasping for breath in the October sun. A few […]

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 […]

There are few plants in flower in the woods this morning apart from Ivy. I find some Wood Sedge alongside the rail bed which still have fruits so spend a bit of time getting some clearer photos than I’ve managed earlier in the year. I wander down the railway track to the old tunnel mouth […]