I thought of Ladysmith Black Mambazos’ song – Rain Rain Beautiful Rain as I drove down to the woods yesterday. Except it hasn’t been beautiful for us! The photo above is a residential road in the town where I live during storm Ciara. It’s next to a river which has flooded twice in the last two weeks. I have lived here most of my life and this only used to occur maybe once in five or ten years. It’s an indication of what the experts keep telling us about climate change. We have had two named storms – Ciara and Dennis plus an almost equally strong unnamed storm this weekend and all in the space of two weeks. I’ve been getting cabin fever and woodland withdrawal symptoms. So although the forecast wasn’t great for yesterday, I needed to get down to the woods to check for any storm damage and some nature therapy.

I arrived early and met one of my woodland neighbours at the gate. He had a car full of bird boxes to put up and we chatted for a while. I had made a rustic box designed for Tree Creepers from the slices of wood I cleaved from his logs from the last visit. I had hoped it would work out well but it was very difficult to make and probably the last one I’ll attempt. These tiny birds normally nest under a piece of loose bark or a crevice somewhere’ so the design is very different to normal bird boxes. It’s wedge shaped and the entrance hole is right at the top and near the back of the box. I think it looks great now it’s fixed and blends in nicely.

I had a long list of small jobs I wanted to do – fix the bird box, drop the hung up tree from last time, take some firewood home, dig up a few plants to edge ponds with, stake up some saplings that had blown over. I managed to achieve all of it which was very satisfying. Before Spring comes I would like to have thinned out more sycamore trees but the windy weather makes that impossible. I think I’ve taken about fifteen down this winter which sounds a lot but has hardly scratched the surface with what needs doing. You can see from this photo there are plenty to go at still and plenty of work to clear up afterwards.

The good news is that no trees have been damaged during the storms and the hung up tree left from felling at the last visit, was relatively easy to bring down safely. I am building a small pond at home now and want some suitable plants to edge it with. There are clumps of Wood Sedge growing all over my woods. It’s looks like a clump of grass on steroids. I dug up a few small clumps to take home and also put a few more around my woodland pond. There’s no sign of life in that one yet but it’s still early. I shall order some oxygenating plants soon for both ponds which should improve their chances. Spring is starting to peep through now. I spotted the first brave shoots of Wood Anemones. and these Wild Garlic leaves.

The morning had started out calm but by mid morning, the wind had started gusting strongly. The tops of the lanky sycamore will crash and clatter together in an alarming way. The danger is not so much of trees blowing over but of dead branches detaching from the crown. So when it gusts hard, it’s time to pause from what you are doing and watch the trees above you. These dead branches are known as widow makers for good reason!

The sun came out frequently and lit up the woodland colours beautifully. After a busy day I took time for a slow walk and some photos. It’s always a joy just to take in the visual beauty and photography acts like a catalyst for me. Looking for potential photos slows your walk down and encourages you to really look. I’ll leave you with a few.