Saturday, March 08, 2008

A spring walk in the wood







Today with my seventieth birthday fast approaching I decided I should take a bit more excercise, so I went for a walk in the wood up the road. The hawthorns and a few hornbeams are leafing, the anemones are out (though rather few this year) and the leaves on the early purple orchids are well-advanced. I took a few photos - of a liverwort new to me (but quite common), even scalewort (Radula complanata) growing on an ash trunk in round patches at chest height; I visited the spurge-laurel (Daphne laureola) which seems to be doing rather well this year. I photographed a patch of anemones, a patch of polypody fern, a toppling tree with orange Trentepohlia algae, and I found a small, battered, red plastic hedgehog deep in the litter. It reminded me strongly of 'Wilson', Tom Hanks's volleyball mascot in the film Cast Away. There is a link here. I brought my 'Wilson' home and have installed it in part of my Square Metre project. I am sure it all has a deeper meaning linked to chaos theory.

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