#TenMinMerlin #TenMinuteMerlin from yesterday — Hainault Forest Country Park, Greater London…but right on the Essex border, so birds might not be Londoners… Common chaffinch Eurasian blue tit European robin Eurasian blackcap Eurasian jackdaw Eurasian blackbird Ring-necked parakeet 1/2

“…some of the most valuable human work lies not in making things new, but in the patient, humble, disciplined practice of helping what matters to endure.” Now there’s a line to live by!

How a Spitalfields blog became bigger than Keanu Reeves. And why, if you want to know London, you need to know @thegentleauthor.bsky.social Wonderful tours (literally, full of wonder), wonderful cake! www.the-londoner.co.uk/how-a-spital...

I did enjoy Jef Page’s presentation on schools in Ilford for @ilfordhistory.bsky.social My grandmother had aviaries in her garden (Lockwood, then Belmont Rd) where she raised birds (e.g. budgerigars) for sale and shows - I have vague memories of going to shows at the Thompson Rooms in mid-1960s.

To the rather wonderful #GardenMuseum in Lambeth this afternoon. Many interesting exhibits, but I was taken by a copy of "Rus in Urbe: or, Flowers that thrive in London gardens and smoky towns", an 1886 gardening book by author and artist Mary Eliza Haweis.

From my Google feed, today, a provocatively truncated quote from an article in The Economic Times. - Chinese proverb of the day: 'It's better to walk thousands of miles than to read thousands of...' #ThoughtForTheDay #FillInTheGap"

#TenMinuteMerlin from yesterday — Hainault Forest Country Park, Chigwell, Essex. Merlin did not pick up the pheasant, calling from the copse on the adjoining golf course, the green woodpeckers on the grasslands on the other side of the woods, nor could it ID the biplane from the local airfield!

From a laid hedge in #HainaultForestCountryPark for #HedgeRowChallenge — guelder rose, hawthorn, field maple. #WildflowerHour @wildflowerhour.bsky.social

Great day on the #QueenElizabethOlympicPark #QEOP today, volunteering with the #ParkChampions. Met an original calypsonian who sang with Lord Kitchener, a former motorcycle #speedway racer, and the widow of a Hollywood great. And the sun shone all day!

The Government has a duty to protect people from legal bullying. The first step? A clear commitment to stamping out SLAPPs in the King’s Speech. Silence helps abusers. Action protects us all. #StopSLAPPs

Shout out to a couple of wonderful #IndependentBookshops we visited during a recent trip to Cornwall. 1/3

Not rare, especially in the fields & hedges near me, but I do love the first proper showing of the spring of blackthorn under a sunny sky. #wildflowerhour #HainaultForest

If it takes 4 hours for a ranger and three volunteers to construct 8m of dead hedge, how long will it take for someone to pull it apart… Hedge building at #FairlopWaters with #VisionRedbridge Nature Conservation.

Back at the Olympic Park - first day this year that has properly felt like spring! #ParkChampions #QEOP

An important read from Dr Amanda Cole, for anyone who wants to understand #Tourettes 🫶

#PoemsOnTheUnderground Now celebrating its 40th anniversary! @london.gov.uk

First hazel flowers. @wildflowerhour.bsky.social #WildflowerHour

“War has always been a test of human skill and courage, not of gender. A bullet doesn’t care which body it shatters and nor should history.”

"Otters in the Roding Otters (says a London correspondent) are more numerous than many people imagine. They work the River Roding, for instance, as close to London as Buckhurst Hill and Wanstead Park." - Ilford Recorder, April 27th, 1906 🦦 @paulpowlesland.bsky.social @wrenwildlife.bsky.social

Between 3–5am in the morning, before the tube opens, tens of thousands of Londoners are already commuting to and from work. Who are they? Fascinating piece from Katharine Swindells for @londonermag.bsky.social

Brilliant talk today from @lucytsmith.bsky.social for @fovm.bsky.social . Fascinating insight into the process of creating the illustrations, many for @rbgkew.bsky.social

Walking #StCuthbertsWay, Melrose, Scottish Birders to Holy Island, Northumberland. Despite the claim on the notice, Wideopen Hill is _not_ the midway point of the walk (although the summit is the highest point).

To the #MiningArtGallery at the #AucklandProject in Bishop Auckland, County Durham. aucklandproject.org/attraction/m... The Pit Road paintings of Norman Corrnish were especially evocative normancornish.com

Fascinating visit to @durhamcathedral.bsky.social for the #MagnaCarta and the North exhibition and Nicola Anthony’s #TheWordsThatBindUs artwork.

for #wildflowerhour #fruits — guelder rose, rose hips (dog rose), haws & sloes. Local blackberries already gone over — we have been eating them since June, and those that are left are mostly dry & shrivelled!

Are there any #typewriter #skystorians on here? Saw this beauty yesterday, and wondered who needed the special keys at the top of the keyboard — £1/1d; £19/10d; £100/.; £1000/1s; £10,000/10s. Google Picture search suggests it is a Royal, but has not helped with the currency keys.

Visit to #EssexWildlife #FingringhoeWick. Highlight was nightingale, cuckoo, and turtle dove all calling at the same time. Shame we can’t post audio files, yet. 🎶

Watched #OceanWithDavidAttenborough this afternoon. Scenes of bottom trawling were devastating. But there is hope. 🐋🐬🐟🐠🌊 #DavidAttenborough #OceanFilm youtu.be/IzG9AwlypaY

A slightly ragged winged green hairstreak, Callophrys rubi — looked like a walking leaf when I first spotted it —demonstrating how that green underwing coloration is produced by diffraction of light falling onto the intricate wing scales.

Photobombing spider for #TreeFlowers

Willows at Fairlop Waters Country Park - I think one goat/pussy willow, one white/weeping…or something else? #TreeFlowers #WildflowerHour

Such an important initiative to create a more nature-literate nation. And a simple mantra: Notice, Name, Nurture. Spent a few hours yesterday at #HainaultForestCountryPark doing the first two. Lots of bee flies over blackthorn hedges.

Re-building bridges; re-building a nation. “Engineering hope: how I made it my mission to help rebuild Ukraine’s critical infrastructure” From @uk.theconversation.com

In a forest at the weekend…#HainaultForest, #WoodlandTrust, that is.

Visit to #EssexWildlifeTrust Thameside Nature Discovery Park yesterday. Teal, redshank & moorhens in the inlets (before the tide came in); little egret landing on the mudflats beyond; kestrel hanging over the picnic area. But we probably spent as long looking at the early spring flowers!

Fascinating morning investigating owl pellets with Beth from #VisionRedbridge at #HainaultForest. Who’d have known that @fieldstudiesc.bsky.social had a guide to the contents!

First blackthorn in bloom (that I have noticed) of the year! #WildFlowerHour #NotYellowFlowers

Notes on #bluesky From my post history it would appear that I have been on bluesky (here and as @theteesra.bsky.social) for a little over a year, now. I have been making more use of this site recently, especially since finally leaving the other place back in January a month ago. 1/4

C18th clock tower at #AucklandPalace - “clock-face blue sky”! #AucklandProject

Very enjoyable few days in Durham (that’s Durham, County Durham). The Durham Castle and Cathedral @UNESCO.org #WorldHeritage site has so much to see, but for us the highlight has to be Cosin’s Library. 1/3

Wonderful museum “double bill” yesterday for my wife’s birthday. Wildlife Photographer of the Year @nhm-london.bsky.social in the morning, followed by @sciencemuseumldn.bsky.social for Versailles: Science and Splendour. 1/4

“…the men of ritual and the men of barbarism are capable of shutting up the men of science and of silencing them forever.” Just finished reading “It Can’t Happen Here” by Sinclair Lewis. “Eerily prescient” — The Guardian (of a stage adaptation in 2016). en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/It_Can'...

Images from a frosty Sunday morning, already a fading memory of a brief cold snap.

Muting hashtags works!👍

Lovely old building. Hearing that there might now be plans to renovate.

Having been told about the pending emergence of tiny female flowers on hazel trees at an inspiring “Nature Corner” event hosted by Beth of the #WoodlandTrust we didn’t expect to see any until the New Year…then spotted this growing on a hazel hedge at Hainault Forest Country Park! #WildflowerHour

The medusa of #HainaultForest. Actually, a turkey oak acorn cup.

To Poppy Fields at the Tower yesterday - a very moving experience, and very clever use of an always impressive space.