Wolves Wild

A poppy with very papery-looking petals which was growing on a pavement last month. Possibly an atlas poppy; definitely a garden escape.

Lots of plants (I seem to notice it more on trees and bushes) have leaves which are a different colour when they first develop. Mostly, they’re reddish. Coloured from growth hormone which is then recycled by the plant leaving the leaves green. Some trees have been bred to keep this colouring: copper beeches among others.

I just noticed that hazel seems to do similar. But instead of various shades of red, the growing leaves have a greyish area. I went back the day after these pictures were taken. All the leaves were green with no trace of the grey.

Iris flowering in a front garden early this month. All that’s left now of the flowers is a few brown and shrivelled fragments.

The popularity of bay as garden bushes probably owes more to the use of the leaves as a herb than to any features of the flowers. They are small, grow in clusters and are not, to my nose at any rate, strongly perfumed.

An alder leaf beetle on a leaf. I didn’t take much notice what kind of leaf it was on, but it definitely wasn’t an alder.

One of the many rats living in West Park, half-emerging from under the bush which quite likely is over its rat-hole. It was manipulating something (I couldn’t see what) with its front paws, then nibbling at it.