Day 57

For the first trip of the day, it was a normal lunchtime walk around the longer of the two loops. It had clouded over since yesterday but I couldn’t really complain about the weather. The first thing of note was the thistle from yesterday where I thought I’d take another picture to show its progress. Not a lot really had changed. Hopefully I’ll get around once more before the weekend to see some progress.

After that I continued on around to the half-way point which is where I usually release the hounds once I’m well clear of the road. You can see from this face why I don’t like them being free near the road.

It was so dry the last couple of walks that I was able to go through the wettest part of the whole walk. In the winter there can be 30 cm of water at this point but right now it is fairly dry if still a bit muddy. It can be negotiated by keeping to the edge rather than taking the usual short detour.

Anyway, that’s about it. The Ragworths are starting to come into flower now – these are considered a serious pest in open fields but in the forest they are an important moth habitat apparently. I think they are at least a couple of weeks early this year as they don’t normally make an appearance until late July normally.