This tree in the back garden of Stanmer House was pruned hard after winter storms brought down some branches and, presumably, weakened others. It was still living then but seems to have died since. Whether death was due to over-enthusiastic pruning or natural causes I can't say but what we are left with looks like a modern statue.
From the Boss: Fern delights in lying in long grass waiting to have a tennis ball thrown.
Between the old brick wall of the council nursery and Stanmer Great Wood is an overgrown and rather neglected apple orchard. All the trees have discs indicating what variety they are. Most are Bramleys Seedlings though there are less common varieties such as Laxton's Fortune, Beauty of Bath and Yorkshire Greening. The apples are just there for the taking.
It's not often one gets to listen to a song thrush in Withdean Park without the noise of traffic intruding. This was yesterday evening.
From the Boss: It's quite disconcerting. I don't know if my map-reading skills are not what I thought or if Rocky Clump really is missing from the Ordnance Survey map. The picture shows part of Rocky Clump on the right and another copse slightly further down the hill. The map (in the side bar) shows only the second copse - it's on the blue line above the word "Stanmer". Rocky Clump should be a bit further west, up the hill towards the wood, more or less beneath the left hand "3" of the "33".
Last night on the television the weather forecast was that today would be sunny. The picture above was taken from the bedroom window at 10.30 this morning. By way of comparison, the same view on a sunny day is shown below, looking over the Hollingbury industrial estate to Old Boat Corner and Stanmer woods.
There do seem to be more than usual this year. This is that field of oil seed rape once again - we saw it a couple of weeks back.
Came across this clump in the middle of a field. They are more usually seen on the verges.
Although this picture was taken only two weeks ago it seems much longer since last we saw a sunset like this.
This covers many of the walks on which the pictures on this blog have been taken. The village of Stanmer is pretty much in the centre with Stanmer woods west and south of the village, including the Great Wood. Down in the south-west corner of the map is a blue triangle superimposed on a black circular line. This is the Roman camp (the triangle marks the trig point) and 39 Acres is just to the north of the words "Hollingbury Castle". The broken red lines mark footpaths and 39 Acres is in the triangle formed by three paths. The new stadium is in the south-east corner of the map.
...is tucked away in a corner of Stanmer valley. On the map it's pretty much in the centre, just under the word "Stanmer".
As we walked across the fields, the sky ahead looked pleasant...
...but look what was coming up behind.
That is what is left of the orangery at the back of Stanmer House. The Boss well remembers seeing oranges and lemons growing on trees in there.
There was a time when it was not unusual to find a torched car in Stanmer woods but nowadays this is quite a rare sight.
But just what it is they have uncovered is a bit of a mystery. Yes, it's chalk, but is it a floor of some sort of building?
On the A23 road to London the northern boundary of Brighton is marked by two stone pillars, known as pylons. These originally stood one either side of the road but the road has since been widened so that the western pylon (the one in the picture) now stands in the central reservation.
This is a field of oil seed rape but the rape flowers have finished. It would have looked really dramatic with both rape and poppies in bloom!
That field behind Moulsecoomb on the road from Falmer to Woodingdean is not the one that was smothered in poppies a couple of years ago but is next to that one.
From the Boss: My eye was caught by the sun reflecting off the windscreens of the parked cars in those roads between the cemetery and Elm Grove.
How many feet have trodden this path over the past two or three thousand years, I wonder? This is the southern rampart of Hollingbury hill fort, known to the locals as the Roman camp.
It did start raining yesterday but before that we had gone weeks without rain and the pastures grazed by sheep had started to turn brown. The barley is green but probably not as tall as it should be at this time.
So we won't be seeing that field covered in pink flowers. Just a couple of days after the last photo, this happened.
From the Boss: In France last week we saw plenty of foxgloves growing on the roadside verges but this one, growing in Stanmer Great Wood, is the only one I have seen in England this year.
I don't like walking on bridges but luckily the Boss doesn't take me over this one between Coldean and Stanmer Great Wood.
