Crack Willow and local sightings

A while ago at Sawbridgeworth Marsh one of the working party was telling me about Crack Willow (apt Latin name Salix Fragilis). It grows by streams, and bits of it regularly fall off, get carried down-stream, wedge themselves in the bank and start growing again.

I was reminded of this when driving into Harlow the other day from the north and noticing that just about all of the trees by the Stort here seem to be Crack Willow. Quite a lot are, well, cracked (see the usual crumby photo). I found myself wondering if all the Crack Willow by the river are the same genetic tree; one enormous ancient tree stretching for miles down the river constantly spreading and regenerating itself.

Anyway, on this same road last weekend a pair of buzzards slowly flapped over, and today at Gilston a couple of small waders in the boggy corner of a field demonstrated classic Green Sandpiper behaviour, i.e. as soon as I got out of my car some distance away on the other side of the road they called and shot off north. And I got my annual winter Blackcap in Sawbridgeworth yesterday – a male in the garden.