Spring Is On The Way

Great now it's a picture of my thumb, still no ribeye

I'm still gggggreat with computers

Ok I give up

Sorry for destroying your spring thread

Andy12345 wrote:Great now it's a picture of my thumb, still no ribeye

Nice thumb Andy    but hey the last picture was OK nice looking low carb meal 

That plate of food does look good Andy...

Back to spring is on the way, it was today, - glorious sunshine - nice on the golf course I would think!

All the best Jan

Yes it was lovely, would've been rude not to bunk off work and have a game, played half the round in short sleeves, lovely

We had a sunny day too   still a cold easterly wind though the forecast is for high pressure to come in from the south

Gah! Two days of sheer misery here. Cold, dull and overcast with rain turning to snow then melting.

I was going stir crazy so went for a walk in what was left of the sun. Walked up from the valley onto the farmland to not find the Golden Plovers again. I didn't even hear any - or Lapwings - in the distance. Saw a Kestrel, a Buzzard, a Blackbird, a couple of Yellowhammers, a few gulls and half a dozen Pigeons.

When I got to the top of the hill the wind was DIRE, but at least I was to the west of a hedge with trees. The latest generation of elms have now become big enough to become infected and die off.

I made it up to where you walk over the bridge to the east side of the hedge, took a few steps and turned back. At least there was still a bit of sun, although the wind had brought a sea fret inland high up and misty.

There were a bunch of Sparrows chiping around the church and cottages, and a few Goldfinches tinkling. As I started to drive home I spotted a Barn Owl in the mirror. I think it was thumbing its nose at me.

Despite it all I have a couple of crocuses almost in flower, and the other day I saw the first couple of primroses of the year. Hopefully the next few days will be better.

In the post above Chris said "Despite it all I have a couple of crocuses almost in flower, and the other day I saw the first couple of primroses of the year. Hopefully the next few days will be better."

I always love to see crocus and primroses.

Our local church has a wall of daffodils coming up nicely. They always look marvelous when the cheery yellow flowers appear. A beautiful sight, which I'm looking forward to seeing in the coming weeks.

All the best Jan

Last year some of the daffs were out before the snowdrops. Not so this year, the snowdrops are coming out all over. Several of the churchyards have hordes of them, and then the daffs to follow on. I can't remember when it was, eighties or nineties I think, when people started planting daffs along the roads into and out of villages and up and down farm drives, in addition to the usual garden ones and bunches on the village greens etc.

My father put some in the hedge opposite our old house, and some twerp would always pick them for Valentines Day. Then the council employed some job creation trainee to trim the verges which didn't help. Round here mostly the farmers do the verges and are much more careful of the wildflowers and things, and the council guys who do the verges in town likewise with the daffs and crocuses people have put outside their houses.

In previous years I've seen the first primroses out before Christmas but so far very few this year. I walked on a different common yesterday and sat in the sun for a while, a far cry from the previous day. The temperature went from 3 C with a wind chill making it more like -6, to 8 C and it felt like much more in the sun. Some of the gorse was in flower enough that you could smell the coconut/vanilla scent - just.

Came back via the farm shop for more Gloucester Old Spots and purple sprouting and Brussels.

Well, it seems it's not about Spring but the Caribbean Vortex, that's heading our way

"If you were feeling cautiously optimistic about our first glimpses of sunshine this year – we’ve got great news for you.
A blast of warm air originating in the Florida/ Caribbean area is making its way to us and could send the mercury soaring to a mighty 17C on Monday.
The heat will start to manifest early from Sunday, warming things up nicely for the start of next week in stark contrast to usual expected temperatures at this time of year, which tend to hover around a chilly 8C."

(paragraph taken from Huffington Post)

Not bad for February ... will we be getting the BBQ out - I wonder!!!

Whatever your weekend plans are - I hope it's a good one

All the best Jan

I took a trip through a bunch of local villages including one where there used to be a bank of crocuses overlooking a stream and facing the road. A few winters back the stream flooded, and I don't know if it washed them from one side to the other or if it washed them away completely and the gardener replanted them, but they are now all along the top of the bank right on the roadside, and probably because the stream stops the temperature dropping too much they burst into flower early. So it proved, a multicoloured display already. Further down the lane another huge patch of aconites.

Lots more birdsong too. Blackbirds and Chaffinches starting to become regular singers.

Cut my grass yesterday afternoon, I love keeping my grass nice, must be spring

Always look forward to the first cut of the year although it can sometimes be a bit of a lottery with my hover mower in the long grass. I sometimes see the odd cat turd fly out of the mower at very high speed so it can be a bit like running the gauntlet :-)

Nice one Mo. The start of your post took me back to the days we had a garden. Nothing like the smell of fresh cut grass, then you had to spoil it by reminding me of the stench of rancid cat shite.

Guess who has 4 bloody cats

Andy12345 wrote:Cut my grass yesterday afternoon, I love keeping my grass nice, must be spring

Your lucky no chance of cutting the grass in my neck of the woods far to wet, it needs a week of dry weather and that's not looking likely after seeing the forecast for the week ahead 

mo1905 wrote:Always look forward to the first cut of the year although it can sometimes be a bit of a lottery with my hover mower in the long grass. I sometimes see the odd cat turd fly out of the mower at very high speed so it can be a bit like running the gauntlet :-)

Strange cats down your way Mo  here they usually dig in the flower beds and cover the crap up afterwards and that's why I always wear gardening gloves when planting 

I do admit to mowing a few frogs though rather messy 

Graham said:
I do admit to mowing a few frogs though rather messy 

Years ago our neighbours had a pond and we quite often used to get frogs jumping across to our garden ... first time it came as a shock to see this 'thing' leap out of the cluster of plants as I was weeding ... actually I may not have been weeding, just picking up a ball that had got thrown into one of the plant borders.

A lovely day at the moment, knowing our weather it could be snowing again at the weekend  

All the best Jan

Jan1 wrote:Graham said:
I do admit to mowing a few frogs though rather messy 

Years ago our neighbours had a pond and we quite often used to get frogs jumping across to our garden ... first time it came as a shock to see this 'thing' leap out of the cluster of plants as I was weeding ... actually I may not have been weeding, just picking up a ball that had got thrown into one of the plant borders.

A lovely day at the moment, knowing our weather it could be snowing again at the weekend  

All the best Jan

Raining all day and a chilly wind again here roll on spring  

Frogs....bit off topic but this has reminded me of a little story from a few years back. We attended a house fire and water is always a priority at these jobs. Fire trucks carry approx 400gallons but you would be surprised how quickly this can go. With 2 hose lines in use, as little as 2 mins before water runs out. Anyway, because of this, we always send someone to locate a fire hydrant to supplement our water supply.
The fire was through the roof and for some reason our water pressure was low, we were running out of water. We wondered if there was a problem with the hydrant so we sent someone to find out. Turns out, this firefighter had lifted off the hydrant cover and there was a frog there. This frog had completely put him off his job. He had completely forgotten to set the hose into the hydrant as he was too busy playing with said frog ! True story :-)

I saw my first daffodil in flower today. Well of course someone might have started it in a greenhouse and planted it out but it looked like the first one of a clump, there are plenty showing their buds now, and a few where you can see the yellow. I have some more crocuses out too, including a lovely lilac patch of Thomasinianus. When I was young and learning the names of dad's flowers I wondered who Thomas was and what his arsehole had to do with flowers.

One of my earliest childhood memories was of fine February days when the sun came out and the entire garden burst into a sheet of lilac flowers, often buzzing with bees from a local beekeeper, while Viscounts and Vanguards flew overhead to Heathrow and Gatwick. They're one of the best for naturalising, I don't know if they're toxic but the mice seem to leave them alone while eating the yellow ones and other varieties. We also used to have sparrows peck the yellow flowered ones to pieces. Oh and I also remember being enthralled to watch the red ants collecting the seeds when they set later in the year and carrying them underground. They also did that with cyclamen, one of his favourite flowers which also naturalised and spread well around his garden.

Someone was out with a mower on Sunday. I usually put off doing mine as long as possible because once you start you just can't stop until November, or even Christmas.

BTDT with the frogs and cat turds both. One year I bent down to do some weeding and smelt cat shit. When I did the same in another part of the garden the same thing happened. Only when it happened for a third time did I realise I'd actually trodden on the turd and it was embedded in the treads of my boot.

mo1905 wrote:Frogs....bit off topic but this has reminded me of a little story from a few years back. We attended a house fire and water is always a priority at these jobs. Fire trucks carry approx 400gallons but you would be surprised how quickly this can go. With 2 hose lines in use, as little as 2 mins before water runs out. Anyway, because of this, we always send someone to locate a fire hydrant to supplement our water supply.
The fire was through the roof and for some reason our water pressure was low, we were running out of water. We wondered if there was a problem with the hydrant so we sent someone to find out. Turns out, this firefighter had lifted off the hydrant cover and there was a frog there. This frog had completely put him off his job. He had completely forgotten to set the hose into the hydrant as he was too busy playing with said frog ! True story :-)

Hehe brilliant all about priorities