Dear Readers, spring has certainly sprung here in East Finchley, so I thought I’d give you a quick guided tour during my lunch break. The flowering currant is splendid as always, and much appreciated by the hairy-footed flower bees and this little blurred ginger blob, who, if I’m not mistaken, is a common carder bee. These small bumbles seem to emerge very early, and to stay around for longer than anybody else, and very sweet they are too.

I love the flowering currant; if it wasn’t for the fact that I need some later flowering plants, I would be collecting them! This one is the self-sown child of the one below, which has much redder flowers, but which is no longer so vigorous as it once was.

I planted lots of grape hyacinths last year, and while the ‘ordinary’ deep blue ones have been up for a while, the pure white ones are just getting going…

I also planted some which were blue at the bottom and white at the top, and they are just beginning to show. I suspect that like many varietals they won’t be as tough and floriferous as their less fancy cousins, but let’s see.

The wood anemones have come back, though I fear our sluggy friends might have been nibbling at the petals.

The Geranium macorrhizum turned out to be a very good buy, it’s been in flower for a couple of weeks now.

And the forget-me-nots are doing well…

As are the fritillaries. What you see beside them is a fancy new deadnettle, just in case you thought things were going completely to pot – I bought them last year and they didn’t flower, so fingers crossed for this year.

The marsh marigold is flowering…

And we are going to have a spectacular show of climbing hydrangea this year, just look at all the flowers…

I was just about to head back indoors when I heard the fluty song of a blackbird. Only it wasn’t, as a rapid-fire combination of whistles and clicks straight afterwards proved. No, it was this little chap. Enjoy your leisure time, starling, you’ll soon have lots of little beaks to feed….