anthony galvin

Hidden Beauty.

Currently my favourite flowers in our little garden are a group of leeks that we planted last year, and then left to bolt, grow and flower. You don’t really see leeks looking like this, but they are beautiful, tall and elegant plants, with fantastic flowering globes. They are also loved by bees, wasps and all types of fly. 

As summer comes to a close I’ve been watching the amazing array of buzzing, hovering and flying miniatures that flit in and out of the tiny flowers. There’s a strange beauty and amazing variety of colour. In a few more weeks all this will be gone and autumn will be here, but for now our overgrown leeks are attracting an amazing and often ignored group of intriguing little creatures.

Clouds over the flower meadow. This afternoon Emma spotted that there was a field between Stewkley, Drayton Parslow and Hollingdon that was marked with a pinky yellow border on the OS map. Access rights, it said. So we went to have a look.

It’s a pretty field, uncultivated, sitting on it’s own a little way from the three villages nearby. It’s certainly not a common and I’m not sure why it’s been designated as ‘public access land’, but it’s very peaceful and I’m glad it’s there.