The wind that shakes the barley

GREEN WAVES shimmer across the hillside fields. I think of my friend David who walked this lane with me ten days ago and who is now in Newfoundland to help crew a 30 foot yacht across the Atlantic.

The wind has shaken the canal-side May blossom. The confetti of round petals has picked out tyre tracks and horse-shoe prints in the black mud of a shady lane. The Figure of Three lock looks like a flower festival with a raft of petals on the water and a marbling of them stuck to stonework.

Battered, faded Peacocks sunbathe on the towpath, a couple Orange Tips flutter around a patch of Jack-by-the-Hedge (a foodplant of the caterpillars) and a Green-veined White feeds on a flowerhead. A number of fresh-looking Wall Browns patrol the verge below the hedges.

A Ground Beetle trots across the lane and disappears amongst the grasses.

While digging out the compost bin I disturb a toad. When I attempt to pick it up it makes a little squeal of protest, a short whistling sound.

Richard Bell,
wildlife illustrator
E-mail; 'richard@daelnet.co.uk'