An early morning walk in the woods

An early start today to take the car in for it's MOT.  Rather than hanging around the garage waiting, we took ourselves off for a walk through the woods.  It was such a lovely way to spend an hour, quiet and reflective.  

We spotted a greenfinch on the telegraph wires, and then watched a couple of swallows skimming across the field.  We've been watching 'Springwatch' each evening for the past couple of weeks, and there was a piece on the programme a few days ago about how to differentiate between swallows, swifts and housemartins, and that was how we identified these swallows, by the low flight across fields as they hunted for insects.  We were quite pleased with ourselves!  As the birds turned in flight, we caught sight of their forked tails and white underbody so we were certain of our identification.

On our return home, I dug out our little book of wild flowers (excellent charity shop find at Christmas) to identify this plant:

 

It is the Common Spotted Orchid (Dactylorhiza fuchsii) which was growing along the paths in the woods.  My knowledge of wild flowers is sadly limited, so I am keen to learn a few more.

We've had another productive day in the garden, moving veg bags around, tying up trailing plants and potting up some annuals I sowed from seed in early Spring.  We're on the look-out for the sweetcorn, but it's a bit difficult to tell seedlings from weeds!