Two Badger Night

Two badgers come visiting. I think a boy and, very obviously a girl - and she, Fluffy Tail, looks very big of belly to me, so cubs are probably on the way!

The Streets of Bonn are lined with pink.

In the old town at least:

If you go down to the woods today....

If you go down to the woods today.... and you look up to the treetops you will find blossom, leaf buds bursting into brilliant green and, at this particular site, huge messy nests.

and woodpeckers,

pretty epiphytic ferns

views across the Somerset levels

bluebells along the path

wood anemones

more bluebells 

herons on their ragged nests

woodpeckers (and squirrels)

and also the diminutive wren. 

This is Swell Wood. An RSPB reserve - more about it HERE.

Today marks 400 years since the death of Shakespeare:

I know a bank whereon the wild thyme blows,

Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows,

Quite over-canopied with luscious woodbine,

With sweet musk-roses and with eglantine:

(A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Act 2. Scene 1.)

Here is that same tiny woodland violet nodding in the wind four centuries on.

What's on the Rhine this lunchtime?

From a height the Rhine sometimes looks quite empty but actually it is very busy - there are huge tankers and container vessels, small river boats, even row boats - all either fighting the strong river flow or benefiting from it (the river is flowing North towards Bonn city centre). I like boats, so here are a few pictures.

This is the 'White Whale' - a tour boat that celebrates the visit to the river many years ago by a beluga. 

The bigger boats come complete with living accommodation and on-roof parking.

By the Rhine

I seem to be strolling besides the Rhine in the sunshine.

First here are some German mallards (as back home they have paired off - the males are mate guarding).

But what is this funny little tuft of ginger fur....

fast moving

ginger fluff

A closer look reveals a red squirrel

It's duckling time!

At first I thought that she was poorly.

She was sitting at the base of the old hollow tree with her wing at a funny angle and kept dozing off. (I started to plan what I might do with a sick duck: where I might be able to take her and, if that failed, where I might keep her - and whether my wildlife first aid guide covered ducks).

A sick duck?

Then she woke up, shifted her position and a little head looked out from under her. Then another and suddenly there were half a dozen mini-mallards at her feet which she had been sitting on and shielding with her wings.

The ducklings emerge

These are the first ducklings of the year down on the canal. A little while later they take to the water....

It's tough bringing up six - especially as a single parent - but the canal offers lots of little hiding places and even some handouts from the locals and visitors.

Badger's back!

Despite a large building project to the back of the garden, there have been some suspicious little dents n the lawn, so I put out the camera trap for the first time this year.

And here is what it caught

It is very difficult to identify badgers as individuals or even to assign a gender but this does not seem to be the big old female who dominated the garden by the end of last year. This may, however, be one of last year's cubs. We shall keep watching.

The little dents in the lawn are 'whiffle holes' a characteristic sign of badger activity and indicating where they have located and extracted a worm.

Spring signals at Prior Park Garden

Snakeshead fritillary

Prior Park Garden is an 18th century landscape garden run by the National Trust.

Here are some pictures from a little walk around it on a Springtime Sunday afternoon.

It famously sits on the steep slope below the grand mansion that was built as a model for the Georgian town of Bath, which it now looks down on.

Bath from the garden

Prior Park Bridge - a folly that spans the lake.

Leaves bursting from the sticky buds of the
horse chestnut tree

Primroses and violets

A mute swan resting on her nest

Very soundly asleep

A European robin pauses in mid-song 

Prior Park bridge

View from the bridge looking up at what is now Prior Park college

Wild garlic in bloom - this is the main ground cover and comes complete with the scent of garlic!