postaldeliveries

Purple DeadNettle

The nicest picture we have taken this week is of Purple Deadnettle. The Deadnettle part refers to its lack of those fine coiled hairs that give normal (The Un-Dead) nettles their antisocial sting. As our Deadnettle has no sting in the head or tail, naturally we eat it. Well, some people eat it. It is rather bitter they say – although I can’t comment on the veracity or otherwise of this. If I remember, I’ll taste a leaf or two and report back.
It’s an early spring plant, spreading out like a dark green and purple carpet, taking advantage of the absence of other contenders for space in amongst the winter-dried leaves and stems of last years growth.
If you were to harvest some and dry it could be very useful in magic. It has a reputation for promoting cheerful vitality and tenacious persistence. With its small bright flowers, appearing in barren patches of roadside verge and hedgerow after the drab sameness of winter, that is certainly well deserved.

Lungwort

This week we have a nice picture of Lungwort. Would you be surprised if I were to tell you that “infusions of Lungwort should be quite safe for most normal healthy people to take”? A herbal remedy for healthy people, then.
Apparently, it does all sorts of cool stuff with free radicals and other things that are currently in vogue, although it is also still used to cure coughs and sore throats. The free radical association comes from some reasonably recent research, but its use to treat coughs and colds has no backing other than that people have been using it for thousands of years.
I have to confess that I find – everyone is doing it – of very little comfort.
Perhaps we had better move right along to pointing out that the flowers are often a pretty shade of pink when they open and turn blue and violet as they mature. This strange behaviour makes it very attractive as a garden plant. It is low growing, a couple of inches high at the most, and grows well in shade – in fact it prefers shade. So, all in all, a good plant for those bare places under trees and bushes where nothing will grow. Whether you have a cough and a sore throat or not.

Daffodil Growing Wild In The Hedge

We keep the most ferocious of our wild daffodils caged up safely – as you can tell from this poem I wrote in April 2013. Apologies to those who don’t understand Cockney rhyming slang – and apologies to those who know how to speak it properly.

Roll hup. Roll hup, me gentlefolk. Roll hup. Roll hup, me dears.
‘ere we ‘ave a hanimal, ferocious, wild and fierce.
‘e’s wild and fierce an hugly has you can plainly see.
Some days ‘e ‘as a hargument an ‘e eats ‘is Nan for tea.
Hi keeps ‘im caged hup safely, don’t want to cause a scare,
an hif by chance ‘e gets hupset, I’ll subdue ‘im wiv me chair.
Jus’ look at hall them ‘ampsteads! If yer promise not to larff
Hi’ll venture hin there wiv ‘im, an stick me loaf hin ‘is norf an saaf.

Coltsfoot

Coltsfoot is one of those plants that make me wonder about the sanity of the human race. Or perhaps it doesn’t – perhaps it’s actually the reason we’re the dominant species.
You see, we’ve been using Coltsfoot for thousands of years as a cough remedy – while it may well help your cough, research, in Germany, in the 1950s, showed that it does serious damage to your liver.
But we do this all the time. Think of potatoes. Up in the Andes the first potatoes they found were seriously poisonous. Eventually, after goodness knows how many Inca died from eating them, they developed a variety that was non-poisonous. Why did they bother? The thing is poisonous. Nothing to see here, move along, please.
I’m sure you can think of a great many other examples (kidney beans, did I hear you say.) It seems that we will not be beaten. If we can run it down or catch, trap, ensnare or pick it we will eat it – even if it kills us.
Oh, and if you’re wondering – the German government banned the sale of Coltsfoot, but by 2005 horticulturalists had produced a non-poisonous variety. What can I say?

Violet

‘Hello there, do you mind if I sit here with you for a while?
‘There’s such a lot going on at the moment, isn’t there?
‘It’s so exhausting, everyone is rushing about, no time to stop and chat, busy, busy, busy. I was looking for a quiet corner to try to catch my breath – and then I noticed you, sitting here by yourself.
‘You don’t mind do you? I don’t want to intrude.
‘Everything is in such a whirl. I tried to talk to some birds this morning but I’d hardly got two words out and they were gone – off to look at a great nesting site, they said.
‘Well I understand of course, time goes so quickly, particularly at this time of year, and it is the early bird that catches the worm, so to speak.
‘The snowdrops aren’t much better, are they? I mean, those white hats were so becoming, but they’re tossing them aside. And what are you left with? Well, they’re just green, aren’t they, the same as everyone else.
‘Then, what about the crocuses? They all looked so pretty before the party, but to look at them now, well, I’d hate to ask what went on there. Most of them are standing around with their party frocks in tatters, looking disinctly, well, disipated, you know what I mean, don’t you?
‘Well, I better be off. Thanks for the little chat, I always find other people’s opinions so stimulating. Good bye.’

Lambs – First Day Out In The Field.

‘It’s OK, honest.’
‘It’s not OK, where’s the barn gone? It was right here until they shut us in that noisy box thing, then when they opened the door it’d completely disappeared.’
‘Please stop worrying. Mum’s here. It can’t be that serious, can it?’
‘Yes, but it’s so, so, empty. Why aren’t there any walls?’
‘Of course there are walls, we just haven’t found them yet. They’ll turn up once we’ve had a chance to look around, you’ll see.’
‘Where’s everyone else? Why are we here all on our own?’
‘Will you stop panicking. Look there, and over there, and over there. Everyone’s here.’
‘Yes, but they’re so far away, Why aren’t they here with us?’
‘Why do you keep asking me question? I don’t know. They’re over there because they’re over there and we’re over here because Mum’s here.’
‘Don’t get cross with me. It’s all scary and different, that’s all.’
‘Sorry. It really isn’t that scary. Can you feel the wind ruffling your fleece, doesn’t that feel good. It makes me want to jump.’
‘Wow, do that again. It looks like fun!’
‘Come on, you try it. It’ll be much more fun if we do it together.’
‘OK. One, two, three, go!’
‘Wait, where’s Mum? Oh, there she is. Right, it’s my turn to count this time.’

Chaffinch

The snow is slowly making its way off, exiting stage left. Google Weather Report did turn up with a brand new snow storm for this week – but nobody asked him to play his party piece and the snow stayed propped up in the corner. I did feel a little sorry for him, but he should have known better.
This week we are all about birds. The Blackbird’s song is actually part of the mating ritual so he only sings in spring. As it’s nearly a year since his last performance, he needs to have a little practise before he feels confident, and we have been hearing the odd warble from the bushes.
The Song Thrush has shown no such restraint, and is, already, belting out his favourite aria from the top of the silver birch at dusk each evening. The Robin, too, is well ahead of the game and telling anyone who will listen that he will not accept the slightest impertinence – from the safety of the centre of the hedge.
Today’s picture is of a Chaffinch, they’re suddenly everywhere, What they lack in vocal gymnastics they make up for in numbers. I suspect this guy is from last years hatching – he’s got that cock-sure teenage attitude about him. He’s wondering if there are any girls watching him and if they think he’s cool – or whatever word the current generation decided to use. They were the first to think up this whole boy/girl thing, after all.