Mother die

The cow parsley is blooming everywhere just now. I had to take a detour to get access to the canal as the lane I usually use was completely blocked by rubbish that someone had fly-tipped during the night. Why do people do this?

I went out with the idea of blipping a butterfly and though I saw a couple of orange tips, the wind and rain was putting everything down, including the early damselfly.

There are lots of regional names and stories around plants. When I was a youngster we used to call the cow parsley "mother die" so you never picked any for your mum because that would mean she'd die. You didn't pick dandelions either because they were supposed to make you wet the bed. Then there was the buttercup test - if it shone under your chin it meant that you liked butter.