Since coming into the care of new owners, the hay field down the lane from our house has been allowed to go to wrack and ruin, and because of this it’s no longer the butterfly and pollinator paradise that it once was. The only vaguely positive thing I can say about it is that if anyone in the village is keen on either sloes or wild damsons, this will be the place to go come autumn, because the hedgerows have run absolutely wild with both kinds of tree. I used to make both sloe and damson gins, but I don’t any more because hardly anyone I know drinks spirits these days, so I haven’t taken part in the unofficial local harvesting competition for several years. Recently though, I’ve been thinking that it might be fun to have some damson jam (though it’s not all that much fun to make the stuff, because of the need to keep skimming out the stones while you’re boiling the fruit), so maybe I’ll exert myself and collect a few later in the year.
The damson blossom has gone over now, but there’s an entire thicket of blackthorn saplings in full bloom, and today (despite a stiff wind and a very brisk temperature) it was thick with bees and hoverflies. Most of the latter were drone flies (various), and a high proportion of the former were honey bees, but I hung around, shivering, and eventually got the shot I wanted, of this lovely female Tawny Mining Bee (Andrena fulva) helping herself to some sloe nectar. I’ll happily photograph this pretty bee in any situation, but I always think that white blossom sets it off especially well.
R: L2, C7, D17.
