Category: David

Taken a few days earlier than the previous picture, but just outside Stratford upon Avon. The season was much more advanced by travelling somewhat to the south.

The buds just beginning to swell on one of the blackthorn bushes on the edge of Barley Field in the Smestow Valley LNR towards the end of March.

Catkins at the end of a twig on a silver birch.

Male and female catkins grow on different trees. The male ones start off looking furry, and give the species its name, before producing the pollen and turning as in the upper picture.

The catkins on the female trees will eventually become the seeds.

Not local, but on the river Avon at Stratford.

From a distance it looked like a couple of miniature boulders; closer, the fungus seemed rather dried up as it grew on the cut surface of the stump of a large tree by one of the footpaths on the Perton estate.