Spring Delights

I took a walk around Winkworth Arboretum today. I was interested to see progress on the new visitor’s centre due to open in the Summer; it looks good with the main building structure up. I was also half wondering whether there were any early bluebells about seeing how advanced Spring is this year.  However, though there was plenty of green growth, there were no buds yet - I’ll come back in April.

I got excited when I saw a patch of blue, but closer inspection showed it to be a clump of Scillia or Squill. My research seemed to suggest this was Spring Squill, but as this really only grows on the UK west coast and not a landlocked woodland in Surrey, I suspect this is wrong, but it is clearly one of the scillia family.

My other spot was this rather sleepy large bee. I hope it woke up and found some nectar. Apparently, dandelions are good for nectar at this time of year, so any tidy gardeners should leave them alone!