February on the Southwell Trail

After posting some photographs from Birmingham in 2014, I return to current photography which has be hampered by the ongoing virus lockdown. The main event during February was a second fall of snow which added some variety to the photography but in comparison to this time in previous years, the activity was significantly reduced. 

Before I move to the snow scenes, both on the Southwell Trail and on Combs Lane, I wanted cover a selection of detail shots taken along the trail. These are a simple collection, looking at the old and new growth in the hedging and on the trees that line the path. 

The new growth came mainly from the Hazel catkins with the first signs of Willow catkins appearing at the end of the month. 

Hazel has both male and female flowers on the same tree (monoecious). The male catkins are the most obvious, long and yellow, like lambs tales. These show as early as November/December. The female flowers are more difficult to spot and are bud-like with tiny red styles. In fact, the styles are so small it is hard to find a good focus as the camera locks on the branches first - manual focus is often the only resort. 

These were the hazel catkins starting with the males, and then females, with the final photograph showing the context for both (the red dots, although out of focus, can just be seen behind the male catkins): 

The male and female flowers of the Willow tree grow on separate trees (dioecious). Before the male catkins come into flower they are covered in a greyish fur which leads to the common description of pussy willows. These were the catkins as they started to appear and represented the first signs that spring was approaching: 

The evergreen ivy was in the middle of it flowering and fruiting cycle during February. Only mature plants produce the dome shaped flowers known as umbels which go on to produce berries that are black when ripe. These were a few umbels I captured during the month:

Coming to the end of their cycle was the Hawthorn fruit known as haws. The next event for hawthorns will be the spring blossoms which appear before the new leaves sprout:

A few dried oak leaves had stubbornly held onto the trees over the winter and I could just see some  new buds emerging:

Finally, a seed pod of the honesty plant or ‘lunaria’, so called because its papery membrane is moon-shaped’. It is also known as the ‘money plant’ e.g. in the USA I think it is called silver dollars. The seeds have long gone but the membranes can stay on the plant during the winter if protected from the weather: