Hazel catkins

I went for a little wander by car this afternoon as the light was good and I wanted to see the countryside.

I drove down many steep back lanes and farm tracks, meandering between settlements and open field systems. I thought of going to see the burial mound close to Leighterton and found a road I hadn't been along before. About two miles north of the village I came to an old crossing of byways, tracks and field boundaries where a dry valley bent around and away into the distance.  I parked and stood by the old Cotswold stone walls to watch a small flock of sheep. There was one black sheep amongst them which I always like to see and we all stood gazing each other for some time.

The wind was strong and very cold with banks of clouds occasionally obscuring the bright sun.  I walked along the lane beside the wall and looked over it and into an old and rather abandoned coppiced woodland.  It was predominantly hazel but because it hadn't been managed for some time other tree species had joined in.

I liked it when a burst of sunlight touched these male flowers, or catkins, of the common hazel (Corylus), which were hanging outside the edge of the wood over the stone wall.  Apparently the catkins and thus the nuts only grow on the outside edge of a group of hazel trees.  If you are inside the wood although the hazel grows well, it doesn't produce flowers and hence no hazelnuts.  What a shame.