6th April, Mrs Turnstone and I were in Woodbridge, Suffolk, for a change of air and scene. A walk across a little level crossing brought us out of town to a bench with an untidy patch of willow scrub behind us and the estuary before us; that was where we were looking, with shelduck, gulls, crows and many different waders. I used to be more confident in identifying these when I could count on using my beach-side lunch breaks from work; however today there were knots, redshanks, oystercatchers, curlews and a whimbrel, as well as oystercatchers, an egret and a few crows.
I would have left the bench happy to have seen these, but there was something else behind us. Not the goldfinches that were highlighted by the pollen-laden pussy willow, but a real singer, a nightingale, happy to have arrived here safely.
Will he and his mate spend the summer in this – to many human eyes – scruffy eyesore? It would be good to think many people will hear him. Mrs T and I are glad to have heard him, newly arrived from the South, just as many of the birds on the mud were preparing to fly to their Northern summer homes.
Well, we’ve always thought of Valentine’s Day as the birds’ wedding day, but this year the bouquet goes to the garden frogs. Mrs Turnstone ran indoors to grab her phone and record the event. We shall have to watch the weather and protect the eggs from frost, if we get any. It is unusually warm. But we have had lying snow in February, half a lifetime ago.
At least we can do a bit for the climate by helping the frogs who choose our pool. That may include covering it to prevent the blackbirds from fishing.
Yesterday Mrs Turnstone and I sought the cooling breeze on the top of Wye Downs and were not disappointed. Since it was St John the Baptist’s Birthday, there was a little extra satisfaction in seeing his plant, Saint John’s Wort. You can buy expensive pills made from it that are said to enhance the mood. Perhaps a walk in a National Nature Reserve would be as effective, at least in Midsummer!
We had gone up North, despite the railway strikes, for an important family funeral. But thanks to the railway strikes, we travelled early and had time for a few reflective walks. The restored Huddersfield Narrow Canal is easy, dry-shod walking; we found warm accommodation in Greenfield village. On a day of showers and sunshine we turned a corner to witness this autumn scene: a watery sun shining through the golden leaves of the beech, the hedge behind it still hardly changed. Can spring be far behind?
Mrs T eventually got to trimming the ivy hedge that grows over our garden wall and helps keeps intruders out. It will never be a masterpiece of topiary, but it is held in check with annual or biannual trimmings.
The main reason for delaying the trim is shown below: the birds nest in it. This blackbird’s nest does not have its lining of mud. Was it abandoned unfinished for some reason, or was it impossible to find the right sort of mud in this driest of summers? For sure the blackbirds raised two broods in the hedge this year.
Here is a fledgling from a few years ago, quite convinced he is invisible.
We recommend respecting the neighbours, they will repay you with interest — plenty of interest as you watch them go about their business.
Let the hedge grow till August, when the last chicks are fledged. Make sure they can get to water for drinking and bathing; ours like the tiny pond opposite the hedge. It gets plenty of shade and is full of oxygenating plants, mostly self-invited. We wish we had more frogs, but our last cock blackbird had been watching the kingfishers, I think, because he had learnt to catch tadpoles to feed his offspring. This year it seemed as though more survived to grow legs and make for dry land. Let’s hope so.
‘They are French apricots today, and very good and juicy, so much better than the Spanish,’ said the stallholder in Canterbury market. I bought a pound – half a kilo – and she wrapped them in a brown paper bag.
As I said, ‘Thank you,’ the confluence of the warm sunshine, the brightly coloured fruit, the French text printed on the cardboard trays, the brown paper bag and the swing with which the lady sealed it with a twist, all together transported me back half a century. Almost without thinking I went on: ‘I remember when I was young, walking and hitch-hiking across France to visit a friend. I bought a kilo of apricots and a bottle of water, they kept me going through the mountains.’
‘You would remember that!’ she smiled: I did indeed.
Clement was about to be ordained a missionary priest, I was travelling to share the joy of his ordination. I was coming to the Massif Central from Switzerland, going cross-country, a challenge then in France.
I hitched a lift to the border on a quiet road, and it was getting dark when I came upon a railway station that offered a slow train to the South Coast. En marche! as they say. I sat in a pull-down seat in the corridor, wrapped in a blanket, and slept fitfully as the kilometres went by. At Nîmes I slept on a bench until morning. The first bus in my direction was going as far as Alès, a market town, where I bought my kilo of apricots and walked on.
Lifts were few and far between but soon I was in the mountains under the blazing sun, eating my way through the apricots and replenishing the water bottle from wayside springs.
I met a cart drawn by two oxen, going the wrong way for me.
I kept on walking, accepting lifts of one or two kilometres until the bus from the morning overtook me, stopped and took me into Marvejols. The driver’s return journey began from there, but his drive from Alès was off timetable so I had a good ride for free. We shared the last apricots.
The driver showed me the famous statue of the Beast of Gevaudan, a man-eating monster from the time of Louis XV; he also showed me the road to my friend’s village where my arrival in a passing car was greeted with congratulations and a warm welcome. A day later, two friends of his offered a lift to Paris which I gladly accepted.
This month Clement is celebrating his 50 years as a missionary priest. Let’s give thanks for his faithful service in all that time.
Today, I’ve been picking apricots from our tree and Mrs T is preparing damaged fruit to make jam to share at Christmas time. The BEST apricot jam. EVER.
While Mrs T took our grandson to the swimming pool in Faversham, I wandered the streets. Along the iron fence between the churchyard graves and the path were clumps of hollyhocks, some well over 2 metres tall. Lovely in the group, lovely each individual bloom, and nature’s way of pushing the boundaries between tame and wild.
When Mrs T had decided the old lilac tree had to go, it went to keep us warm, thanks to the woodburner. In to replace it came a crab apple called John Downie. A welcome addition to the garden and much friendlier to its neighbours than the lilac, which hogged all the surface water and the light. Maybe we can, at last, grow hellebores here. Whether or not that happens, this is John Downie’s Spring moment!
Come the Autumn and those little branches will be full of deep red apples which make a well-coloured jelly.
It has been windy but bright these last few days, just the weather for windflowers, wood anemones. Mrs Turnstone’s walk took us up to the University woods to greet them. Here they are are very pale, even white. Across town in Larkey Valley woods there are patches of such a dark pink as to merit being called purple. I had a photo of them, somewhere …
Will Turnstone 