Woods and water

Today my sister and I decided to visit the Isabella Plantation in Richmond Park. We went last year and I remember going many years ago when I were but a lad. It was labelled on a 1771 map as Isabell Slade.   Slade, or sleyt, meant a bog or open space between woods and or banks, and isabel meant dirty or greyish brown, referring to the colour of the soil there. Not very entrancing - I'd assumed it was named after some noble lady!

It was maybe a wee bit early for a lot of the collection, though some rhododendrons and many azaleas were flowering. There's a wonderful collection of plants there, many of them labelled, and several ponds which were fringed with ferns, skunk cabbage and marsh marigolds. I happened to meet a couple of the gardeners and had a great chat - see extra 1 - it turned out that one of them was familiar with the Woodland Garden in Bushy Park where I used to work in the early 1970s and knew some of the staff that were there when I was. Extra 2 is of one of the Mandarin ducks which swim about in the ponds. I've omitted the one of the rushing rat!

Later on we visited a garden centre where we had tea and I treated my sister to a Marsh marigold - Caltha palustris. Another good, planty day!