Festival gardens are not as smart as they used to be, but we came across some of the Friends of the park, valiantly clearing and planting in the heat. The big lake was almost dry and the smaller shaded lake was also down to a large puddle. The birds all seem to have deserted it, and we saw just two Moorhens in a shady overhang. Later on some scruffy-looking Mallards flew past. There were some unidentified dragonflies and damselflies around the remaining water, and a white butterfly (Large white?) foraged on a Buddleia.
There wasn’t a lot of wildlife interest, just the autumn seeds and berries coming along. We noted big bunches of seeds on Sycamore and Ash and lots of Alder cones forming. There were occasional apple trees with lots of small apples about the size of a tangerine, too big to be crab apples. The weather must have suited all of them in early spring when they were flowering.
Hawthorn is doing well, too.
The softer berries seemed to be sparser, probably due to the summer drought. Guelder Rose and Dogwood both had rather small and scrappy bunches of berries.
After lunch we walked northwards along Otterspool promenade, part of the way towards Liverpool. There were no birds worth noting on the river, just a few gulls bobbing about. We hoped to see Turnstones along the edge, but no luck, although they do like it along here at low tide. It was too hot to go any further than the Britannia Inn.
Public transport details: Train from Central at 10.13, arriving St Michael’s 10.20. Returned from Riverside Drive / Britannia Inn on the 500 bus at 1.22, arriving Elliot Street at 1.40.
Next week we plan to go to some open gardens from the National Garden Scheme. Meet Elliot Street 10.am.