David

One of the group of waxwings by the canal at Compton
last week, here in a rosebush as it was picking off hips to eat.

The old year’s seeds and the new year’s catkins growing from the same tree.

Seeds and catkins were both covered in frost when I took the pictures during the cold spell in December.

Groundsel is never the most spectacular of plants, but this was one of several which was in flower yesterday.

Some seed is also just visible (the white of the dandelion-like dispersal mechanism).

Waxwing, one of a party of a dozen in the Dell Field of the Smestow Valley Nature Reserve, by the canal,
last week.

They were resting in the tops of the taller trees by the canal, then making forays to eat rosehips and haws from nearby bushes.

Small stagshorn fungus are perhaps a centimetre long, but made more noticable by their yellow colour when fresh.

They are common growing on dead wood, like this felled trunk in EastPark.

Velvet shanks are fungi which are one of the few things growing even in the depths of winter. They can survive being frozen solid, thawing, and continuing to grow.

These were on a stump in the grounds of the Chestnut Tree pub in Finchfield.