A TUMBLED CRACK WILLOW astride the beck in the wood is covered by a fur-like layer of green moss. The usual blackbirds and great tits are foraging.
The moss around a clump of Snowdrops, near the path gives them the look of a florists basket arrangement.
As yet there are few green shoots so mosses are conspicuous alongside the paths and in the hedgerows. One frondlike bright green moss has golden tips to its shoots.
On a canal-side concrete wall a cushion moss has sprouted large light green spore cases on wiry stalks.
Some 20 Fieldfares amongst the Starlings on the valley side pasture.
The hens suddenly shoot up the garden, the bantam cockerel and a white hen peer in through the patio doors. Later he covers her, whether in a botched attempt to mate, or just to show who's boss is hard to judge.Richard Bell,
wildlife illustrator
E-mail;'richard@daelnet.co.uk'
