Читать книгу The Times A Year in Nature Notes - Derwent May - Страница 82

THE FIRST CHIFFCHAFFS from the Mediterranean have arrived and are singing their metallic ‘tink-tank’ song in the treetops. These little green warblers roam around when they first appear, looking for insects on sallow flowers or wherever else they can find them, but as more birds come in at the end of March or the beginning of April they all settle down in their summer territories.

Butterbur is in flower at the edge of streams and in damp woods. It has a long pinkish spike of little florets on top of a pink-and-white stem, which makes it look more like a ‘pointed hat’ toadstool than a flower. Sometimes the flowers are white or cream-coloured, and it often grows in colonies that take over a whole stretch of stream bank. The leaves come after the flowers, and grow until midsummer, by which time they may be a yard wide. They were once found convenient for wrapping up pats of butter.