Wednesday 10 June 2015

The beauty of roadside verges

It's wonderfully sunny today, perfect for photographing poppies, so for today's 30 Days Wild Challenge I thought I'd wander along to take photos of my favourite roadside verge. It's a relatively short stretch of verge beside London Road on one side and Lower London Road on the other.



It really is magnificent this year (after a very disappointing year last year).
 

I normally only ever see this verge from the bus and today's trip allowed me to fully appreciate it in more detail than is possible even from a stationary bus.

The red poppies are the dominant species here



but there are also corncockles (the pink flowers)

and a few cornflowers(the blue ones)

 and some ox eye daisies


plus spear thistles, ragwort, cleavers and probably many other species I've overlooked. There are also several trees in the verge including hawthorns

There were a few bees flying around, including this buff bottomed bumble bee

Meanwhile two swallows and two swifts flew overhead and a house sparrow landed on the fence next to me as I was taking photos, but moved too quickly for me to get a photo of it!

Roadside verges are becoming more and more important as refuges for our wildflowers as flower rich meadows are poisoned with pesticide or built on.

Plantlife, the charity that looks after and campaigns for the UKs wildflowers is currently running a Road Verge campaign asking members of the public to call on public bodies to look after roadside verges better to allow our wildflowers to flourish. You can find out more and add your name here.

As ever, red text contains hyperlinks that take you to webpages where you can find out more.





10 comments:

Larry Kollar said...

Pretty! Around here, we have various wildflowers on our roadsides, most notably daffodils in early spring and ox-eye daisies later on, but soon the kudzu overwhelms everything. Then the mowers come…

Good to see that some roadsides can be left to grow wild and look nice!

TexWisGirl said...

truly beautiful!

Lynn said...

It's always interesting to see the differences in what we call things in the US. I've never seen the word "verge" used for what we call a "bank" - but I'll think about that every time I see one now.

Yours is lovely - love the poppies especially. I love it when they plant wildflowers on public spaces like that.

Ian Doyle said...

That's a very pretty and colourful roadside verge I can undertand why it's your favourite.

Simon Douglas Thompson said...

Much better year for poppies this year, as you said there was barely any around last year in their usual spots round here

RG said...

Yes - I know the term "verge" - "on the verge of screaming." - but never used as the shrub and flower and weed and such space along a road!

Where I live, most of them are either scooped out to allow storm water to flow fast of else mowed down frequently (or sprayed) to provide visibility. Fortunately there are campaigns here to change that thinking too!

Anonymous said...

Really love these photos - especially the sixth one of the red poppies against the blue sky and the bars!

eileeninmd said...

The poppies are beautiful, a lovely sight to see! Enjoy your day!

Pietro Brosio said...

Very pretty and joyful pictures!

Sallie (FullTime-Life) said...

Wonderful poppies; I love this challenge you are on.