• There is a long field adjacent to the River Wye between Lydbrook and Goodrich that is quite often full of onions, but this year it is full of yellow-flowering Rape. I’ve been past it a few times, but today I managed to stop and take a pic. Its so bright it looks like a river of yellow flowing alongside the real river. And it smells! A strong sweet honey-like scent fills the air.

  • Here’s the latest video, how to draw a seal. Actually it shows you how to draw a seal and a sea lion. There are subtle differences in the ears and the flippers. Then Sea :ion can bend it’s flippers underneath and use them as feet to walk on. Seals just have flippers and have to lurch and lunge themselves around on dry land.


  • I went for a walk in the Forest this week, and the sap is definitely rising. Although a cold wind is blowing from the north, Spring is here at last.

    You can see it best in the ferns that are bursting out of the ground everywhere you look. I love the way they uncurl and open out as if they are all packed away underground, and are just being blown up inside, like curly, party blow-outs tooters.

    There used to be a quaint tradition here, where young lovers would go into the Forest for a bit of privacy. It was known as a Fern Ticket. I remember the local paper printing Fern Tickets for you to cut out and give to someone you admire to let them know you wouldn’t mind a private walk in the Forest with them. If That doesn’t get the sap rising, I don’t know what does!