Edford Wood revisited

This is the first of four posts on a return visit to Edford woods. I first went there earlier this year, back in March to see the wild Daffodils and promised myself I would return later in the spring to see what might have come up in the meantime.

It is a Somerset Wildlife Trust Reserve which lies about 15 minutes drive west of my hometown of Frome.As the sign says, this particular circular walk around the wood is only open from February through to May. I'm not sure why this is, but I realised I was running out of time to get my return walk in this year.The first thing I noticed almost straight away was how much lusher the vegetation was (see my previous post in March called Daffy Day) and also the pungent smell of the 'wild garlic' or Ramsons which followed me the entire way around my 3 hour walk. Good thing I like the smell! (-:Where there had been carpets of wild Daffodils a few weeks ago, the ground was now smothered in this beautiful and useful wild onion.Many people still use Ramsons in their cooking. I haven't tried myself as yet!Here's a close up of the flower with the stream as a backdrop.I think this is a stretch of the Mells stream (Mells being a village between Edford Wood and Frome) that runs through the wood. It has Dipper, Kingfisher and Grey Wagtails along this stretch.As I was having atrocious luck with getting anywhere photographing birds today, I turned my lens towards the wild flowers found in this ancient woodland habitat. This dainty flower is the Water Avens (Geum rivale) and is apparently quite rare in southern Britain, it likes damp woodland as it name suggests.Another woodland speciality is the Wood Spurge (Euphorbia amygdaloides). It favours broad-leaved woodland and its local Somerset name is 'Devil's cup and saucer'.Here is a close up showing the 'cup and saucer'. Euphorbia in its cultivated forms is a popular garden plant.

More on Edford woods to follow....