Nature Journal: Week One

March 25th 2020:
Day one, the start of our daily photographic nature journal for this time of isolation. For us, this is a way to document our tenth spring living here, the strangest of springs, and we hope that it might bring a bit of nature goodness to those of you who are for now, stuck indoors.
These flowers are currently in bloom in the woodland right now (clockwise from top left): Primrose (Primula vulgaris), Cuckoo Flower (Cardamine pratensis), Lesser Celandine (Ficaria verna), Common Dog Violet (Viola riviniana)

March 26th 2020: 
Fern fronds unfurling on the woodland floor. These tiny curly creature-like forms are the beginnings of the bracken that dominate the ground flora in sections of the woodland in summer. 

March 27th 2020:
Wood anemones in flower, beginning to droop their heads and close as the sun sets. These are more numerous in the areas that we selectively coppiced several years ago. It’s taken 3 or 4 years for the difference to be noticeable; wood anemones spread very slowly via rhizomes.

March 28th 2020:
Woodpeckers are drumming with great enthusiasm now, especially in the mornings. Climbed up a hazel tree to get a closer look at these woodpecker holes in this oak - no one home right now.

March 29th 2020:
The wind has swung around and is coming from the north today and we can hear the change as it blows through the trees. Each species plays a different tune; by now we can almost identify a species of tree by sound alone. The Scots pines swoosh and swish as their soft needles are agitated by the cold breeze, escalating to a loud drone in strong gusts. The wind roars through the still bare oak branches, then clatters ash branches like bones behind the house before whooshing through the pines out front and fading. Like waves crashing on the shore and then receding. First day of BST yet snow showers accompanied the cold northerly.