Is it springtime yet? In October, when the days are shortening and the leaves are turning from green to gold, it feels nice to cozy up on your couch with a cup of tea and a book, or your favourite new show. The nights are dark and starry, or cloudy and wet, Christmas is coming and there is a feeling of ending to the year but that’s okay because it’s only just started. Fast forward four months, you’ve had weeks of dark mornings and short afternoons, the trees are bare, and everything feels grey, you’re done with winter and it’s time for spring.
That’s sometimes how I feel at the end of a long, wet few months with no snow and no frost. Summer seems an age ago, I only have hazy recollections of long hot days with nature in a green abundant frenzy, but now that February has arrived, I am beginning to see the first hint of spring approaching.
For me February is a herald of spring, and early springtime is what I will be writing about in the last of my three posts on winter walks.
It probably helps that we seem to be experiencing a particularly mild February this year, no doubt the increasing problems of a warming planet are contributing to that, and it’s a frightening prospect both for nature and humanity, but after the darkness of December and January you can’t help but feel your spirits life when you get a warm and sunny February day.
There is lots to enjoy when you’re out walking in February, you’ve survived winter, gloried in the bright flashes of colour in December, embraced the chilly quiet days of January, and now you can look ahead to the promise of spring.
Having a free Saturday near the end of February I decided to take myself off to the National Trust estate of Wallington, as my most recent member magazine had assured me that a combination of gardeners and visitors had planted 800,000 snowdrops since 2015, this promised to be a perfect walk to spot those first signs of spring.
The National Trust website tells us that Wallington was last lived in by the Trevelyan’s, before it was gifted to the Trust, and they were a family who loved to be outside in nature. This meant a house surrounded by gardens, woodland, and parkland, with lots of walks around the whole estate. Actually, a lot of the formal gardens and parkland was redesigned during a previous owner, Sir Walter Calverley Blackett’s, time. I wasn’t surprised to read later that Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown was also involved in the landscape redesign with Blackett, once you’ve started visiting stately homes you soon begin to recognise Capability’s style.
After arriving at Wallington, waving my National Trust card out the car window at a staff member, and then parking, I slung on my rucksack, took a quick detour to the information centre for a map, and then set off in pursuit of snowdrops and springtime.
I didn’t need to walk far to see my first snowdrop, the walkway to the courtyard was bordered by woodland and the bright white heads of snowdrops could be seen covering the ground between the trees. As I made my way round the China pond and down towards the walled garden, skirting alongside the Garden pond, I spotted hundreds of snowdrops everywhere. In the weak February sun, they were a brilliant white against the dark ground, a strong sign that warmer days are on their way.
Snowdrops, or to give them their scientific name, Galanthus nivalis, are not native to the British Isles, which is hard to believe considering how widespread they have become. According to the Woodland Trust website they are thought to have been introduced as ornamental garden plants in the 16th century, but not recorded in the wild until 18th century. There are now around 20 different species of snowdrop that can be seen in the wild, and nothing lifts the heart on a cold winter day than seeing your first clump of snowdrops.
After seeing dozens and dozens of snowdrop clumps on my walk to the Walled Garden my heart felt so lifted it could probably have been used as a hot air balloon. I was not, however, prepared for the site that greeted me when I walked into the formal walled garden, there was an entire lawn covered in purple crocuses.
I had read on the Trust website before visiting, that there was a crocus lawn, but this was spectacular, suddenly it didn’t feel like February at all. The sun was out and there were splashes of bright colour all around me, further into the garden I spied a bed of white crocuses, their orange centres standing out against the pale petals. Pinkish cyclamen was beginning to flower in the formal beds, and I heard a robin singing from the top of the wall.
Once I left the gardens, I began to feel that the river walk around the Wallington parkland might be a bit of a letdown, what could live up to a lawn full of purple crocuses after all. Fortunatley I was wrong, the gardens had simply set the stage for a spring time walk. As I walked through the woods, I spotted patches of pale yellow Primrose, and bright yellow Winter Acoynte, both widespread woodland flowers that, along with the snowdrop, are among the first flowers to bloom in the new year. The scientific name for Primrose is ‘Primula’ meaning first, and the flowers can sometimes be seen almost as early as December.
Further along the river I heard a call of a Dipper and saw the brown and white water bird skimming along the surface of the water as it flew upstream. High in the trees I picked out the birdsong of Robin’s, Coal Tits, Blue Tits, Dunnocks, Blackbirds, and even a Nuthatch. Though the Coal Tit and Nuthatch were only recognised with some help from my Merlin birdsong app, which is proving very helpful when I get stuck on identification.
If I didn’t feel like I had seen enough snowdrops in the gardens, then there were more than enough scattered about the woodlands to satisfy my feeling of spring time. While returning to my car I was treated to the sight of even more snowdrops, their delicate white heads bobbing gently in a breeze that had picked up.
The promise of spring and longer days has always brought a sense of hope to nature, the cycle of the year is essential to everything, but springtime is a sign of new beginnings and new life. In the Wheel of the Year, an annual cycle of ancient seasonal festivals, Imbolc was the festival of springtime, it coincided with the start of the spring sowing, and celebrated the start of a new year.
As is often the case in Scotland and the North of England, we can enjoy a balmy February only to struggle through a freezing March and snowy April, but at least today had given me that first sight of spring, with the long days of summer behind it.
Every season has its own ups and downs, winter has short cold days and long cold nights, but hopefully my Wildlife Scribblings on winter walking has highlighted a brighter side to winter, and what can be enjoyed in nature during the coldest season of the year.
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