The blog this week is written by Claire, one of our long-term volunteers at Loch of Strathbeg
As the weather this week hasn’t been at its best and seems these past two days to have taken a turn for the worst, it’s difficult to realise that summer is less than a month away. As I sit here in the office listening to the wind whistling through every small crack it can get through in the house, seeing the trees bent with the force of the gale, and looking at the thermometer registering temperatures under 10 degrees, it feels like a day at the start of March.
The plants and flowers around the garden however, tell a different story. At Strathbeg this week the cuckoo flowers are putting on a show! They have come out and created lovely patches of delicate pink near the side of the entrance road, and some have been seen of a lighter colour, almost white, further in the lowground. Flowers are starting to unfurl in the large swathes of comfrey also by the side of the entrance road and they will probably really be out by the start of next week. The dandelions, usually at their best in April in most of the country, have finally really started to flower, and the daisies have carpeted the scrubland on the way to the airfield giving it an almost snowy aspect. The fields in the reserve are dotted with red campion, and the sides of ploughed fields and roads are full of coltsfoot and wild rhubarb. Even the smallest of flowers can show you a change in the seasons, like the hairy bittercress, admittedly growing as a weed in the wildlife garden, that has finished flowering and seeding.
If you do happen to go through the wildlife garden, here’s what you can see right now: there is quite a collection of primroses, that are coming to the end of their flowering time, but are still quite colourful, and the saxifrage is still in full bloom. The common solomon’s seal is out too, impressive pendulous white flowers hanging all in a row. There are lots of other plants that are becoming more obvious as the days go on, although the flowers haven’t appeared yet: the herb robert and other geranium species are growing bigger day by day, as are the lavenders, the hostas, the strawberry plants, the dogwoods and the dog rose.
Alison and I are doing our best to wage a war on the creeping buttercup, grass, docks and rosebay willowherb, but you will see those too, and to be honest they are lovely plants when they come into flower (yes, even the grass).
A vegetable patch has also been started in the garden! Iain has sown red onions, carrots and mixed lettuce in there at the moment. They have started to grow, but there seems to be a vegetable-loving creature around that has been nibbling at the onions! What is to be done? More to come on both these matters in next weeks’ Botanical Sightings blog.
In the woodland garden the bluebells should be out by the start of next week and there are hints of meadowsweet leaves here and there.
Of course the best places to see meadowsweet growing are in the very damp areas of the reserve, like the marshlands, where marsh marigolds and lovely little marsh violets are flowering right now. The flag irises are loving the areas that the ponies have grazed, but there aren’t any signs of flowers yet. There is also quite a lot of wild angelica, and of course the prehistoric horsetails that can be seen growing in the burn that crosses the new path to the Fen and Bay hides that will soon be open.
If you go up towards the Tower Pool Hide, look out for the tiny white flowers of the sticky mouse-ear and the even smaller yellow or blue flowers of the changing forget-me-not, that like growing on the bare gravelly ground at the side of the path.
The lovely gorse bushes that are so common in the countryside here are often overlooked, but it is really worth stopping to admire them for a moment. Their golden yellow flowers dominated the landscape at this time of year and their scent is a superbly exquisite tropical coconut smell that, even in the coldest windy weather, can transport you to warm sunny lands.
Last but not least in this list of plants to see right now are the sea cliff flowers at Troup Head and Fowlsheugh: red campions! They are beautiful and they are everywhere. Dotted here and there amongst them are some white campions and stichworts too. Thrift is also carpeting large areas of the cliffs with its pale pink flowerheads, and scurvy grass is creeping in between the ledges full of birds down the cliffsides, decorating them with green and white. No sign of squill at Troup Head yet, although we’re expecting those little blue flowers to appear very soon, but look closely and you may see some woodrush amongst the grass.
So if the weather is getting you down and you feel like it is midwinter, go into your garden, a nearby wood or come to Strathbeg, and look up at the trees or lower your eyes to the ground at your feet. Yes, spring is here and summer is definitely on the way.