One good thing - 30th April 2020

The last two days of April have brought the type of weather usually associated with the month, heavy pulses of rain and sunny intervals.

When the showers passed through in the evening the lighting effects were really intense, changing by the second.  The rain has really brought a spurt of growth to Spring flowers....

Wood Anenomes (Anenome nemorosa) are at their peak, tens of thousands of lovely white stars in the Birch woodland.

On an area kept as a natural wildflower meadow there's been a sudden flowering of Cowslips (Primula veris) - soon the whole meadow will be studded with yellow flowers.

In the woods again, and the first of the late Spring flowers are beginning to appear, the delicate bowed heads of Wood Sorrel (Oxalis acetosella) are appearing.  Both flowers and leaves of this plant fold in the evening, perhaps an inbuilt frost protection measure.  The leaves, if chewed, have a zesty lemon flavour from the oxalic acids thy contain - a great natural freshener for the mouth.

Rain is not often something to relish in Scotland where we usually have it in an overabundance - but at the right time, in the right amount, it's a good thing.