Dunwich Beach and Dingle Marshes

Tags

beach, birds, buck's-horn plantain, common scurvygrass, Dingle Marshes, Dunwich beach, gorse, little egret, plants, reeds, sea campion, seashore, sheep's sorrel, shingle, Suffolk, wader

On May Bank Holiday, the first Monday after May Day, Rumburgh village always holds a fair and Rumburgh church always has the cake stall – a money-earner, though not as good as the tea tent.  This year, I had made a honey and ginger cake which Richard and I delivered to the stall along with a quantity of our rhubarb, which usually sells well.  We didn’t stay long as we had a few chores to do at home and we had planned to go to the seaside in the afternoon.

The day was cool and breezy and rain was forecast for late in the afternoon so Elinor, Richard and I set off as soon as we had had our lunch.

We found ‘Thelma’ hauled far up on the shingle.

We looked inside her and what did we find?

A dried-up dogfish tail.

The wind was cold and strong on the beach and the spray from the waves was being blown about.

Looking north up the beach….

…and southwards.

Inland, behind the shingle bank, is Dingle Marshes Nature Reserve, looked after by the RSPB (Royal Society for the Protection of Birds) and The Suffolk Wildlife Trust.

Richard contemplating the view. It was good to be out of the wind!

Plenty of Sea Campion (Silene uniflora) were in flower.

A Little Egret ( Egretta garzetta) was wading through the marsh

Here it is again, marching purposefully on!

Another view of the marshes with a bright yellow ribbon of Gorse (Ulex europaeus)

Common Scurvygrass (Cochlearia officinalis)

A plant of saltmarshes and increasingly, along the sides of roads that have been salted during the winter.  (Danish Scurvygrass (Cochlearia danica) however, is seen more regularly than Common Scurvygrass on roadsides).  Common Scurveygrass has almost circular fleshy leaves with a few blunt teeth along the edges.  The seedpods are spherical and a few can be seen on a flower-cluster close to the centre-right edge of this photo.  In that same cluster of flowers and seedpods is a tiny yellow-beige 16 spot ladybird which fees on pollen, fungi and nectar.

In the past, scurvy was a very common disease, often fatal, in those who spent much of their time at sea.  Their diet was restricted to salt pork and dried biscuit and they had no fresh fruit or vegetables.  Many on land also had restricted diets so it was a happy day when herbalists discovered that scurvygrass, with its high vitamin C content, was one of the foods that prevented the disease. It became the fashion in 17th century England to take a glass of scurvygrass water every morning. The leaves were made into a beer called scurvygrass ale.

The gorse was so bright and cheerful.

Gorse is also known as furze or whin and grows on the acidic soil of heathland and close to the sea.  It is an excellent fuel and burns quickly and fiercely in dry weather causing heath fires to spread.  It was grown near houses so that washing could be lain out to dry on it and the prickles would prevent the clothes from blowing away.

There was plenty of Sheep’s Sorrel (Rumex acetosella ) with its red flower-spikes.

Sheep’s Sorrel is more sprawling than Common Sorrel and is usually found on very poor sandy soil.  The leaves contain the chemical calcium oxalate which tastes acid; the name ‘sorrel’ comes from the old French word for ‘sour’ (‘surele’).

Lovely rosettes of the leaves of Buck’s-horn Plantain ( Plantago coronopus)

The seeds of this plantain exude a large amount of mucilage when they get wet.  This gummy stuff was used in France to stiffen muslins and other woven fabrics.

There were paths through the reeds.

And an approaching rain shower.

A small wader

Here it is again. Apologies for the poor quality of my picture.

This is the same bird in both photos but I am unable, through ignorance, to identify it.  It may be a sandpiper of some sort.  I am sure someone will be able to suggest a name.  It moved about very quickly.

An information board.

Please click on any of my photos to enlarge them.

Another information board.

We soon left for home before the rain arrived and had a warming cup of tea.

 

Two Short Walks

Tags

Bridge Street Bungay, Bungay, Dunwich, Dunwich beach, walking

After three days of glorious blue sky and sunshine, the sun not powerful enough to melt the thick frost and ice in shady places, we woke yesterday morning, the first of the new year, to gloom and cloud and increasing wind.  Richard and I had hoped to go to Minsmere with Elinor, walk round the bird reserve and have lunch in the café.  However, after her late night seeing in the new year Elinor didn’t get up til midday by which time it was too late to get there for lunch.  We decided we would try to get to Minsmere at the weekend and drove to Dunwich and had a short walk there instead.

Rough sea at Dunwich beach

No matter what the weather, there are always at least two tents belonging to sea fishermen on this beach.  I only had my phone with me so these photos aren’t too good.

We found it difficult walking on the beach because of the strong, cold wind and Elinor who hasn’t been very well recently decided to return to the warmth of the car.

The coast here is being eroded away very quickly and there are frequent land-slips.

I am glad I don’t live in the house whose chimneys you can see at the top of the picture.

Dunwich, in the 13th century was a port city equal in size to London (as it was then).  It had six churches, two monasteries and its own mint.  In 1286 a storm washed away many houses into the sea and this was followed by three further storm surges in quick succession until almost all of Dunwich was lost to the sea with only a tiny fragment of the city remaining.  There is a legend that the church bells can still be heard tolling beneath the waves on quiet days.  The port and river mouth became silted up and the trade went away.  The storm surge we had in December 2013 caused a lot of damage all along this coast and many people are still in danger of losing their homes.

Archaeologists have been working in recent years to map the sea floor across the entire area of the town.  A lot of ruins have been discovered and stones with lime mortar attached dating back to the early medieval times.  This is the largest medieval underwater site in Europe.

The huts contain winching gear to help pull the boats back up the beach.

The ‘must-have’ gear of a fisherman

About ten days before Christmas I went shopping in Bungay and, as it was a nice day and I wasn’t in a hurry I decided to walk down Bridge Street to the river and see how high the water was.

The colourful houses in Bridge Street.

Looking back up the street towards the Buttercross in the Market Place

More colourful houses

And yet more!

The white heap is two Mute Swans. I didn’t have my camera with the zoom lens and this is the best I could do.

The River Waveney seen from the bridge.

Looking at the River Waveney from the other side of the bridge.

If you would like to hear more about Bridge Street please click here to listen to local historians and residents talk about the area.  Turn up the volume on your phone/computer.  In the recording you will hear about Nursey’s the sheepskin shop.  Unfortunately, since this recording was made the shop has had to close as they couldn’t find a buyer.

 

I hope you enjoy listening to this audio tour.

Happy New Year to all my readers!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dunwich Flora

Tags

asters, Bird's-foot Trefoil, boat winches, common green grasshopper, common restharrow, dock, Dunwich beach, fish-and-chip café, Going to college, hare's-foot clover, harrowing, hop trefoil, humming-bird hawkmoth, parsley water-dropwort, prickly sow-thistle, sea campion, sea mayweed, shingle, yellow horned poppy

Monday was a strange and busy day.  I was up much earlier than of late – 6.20 am to be precise so that I could wake E at 6.30.  It was her first day at City College Norwich and to get there on time we needed to leave home at 7.30.  R was travelling to Scotland later in the day and we wouldn’t be seeing him until Thursday.  He went into work for a few hours and then drove to Norwich airport to get a flight to Edinburgh where he got a hire car so he could drive to his hotel in Dunbar. E had three hours of English and then I would be collecting her again at 12 midday.  We got to the college through fairly heavy rush-hour traffic with twenty minutes to spare before her lesson started.  I dropped her off and then returned back home to continue with the washing which I had already started.  Home at 9.15, rushed about a bit, back in the car at 11.15 and was outside the college again just before midday.  E was already outside as her tutor had let them out a little early.  Thankfully, she had enjoyed herself and had met up with the Irish girl she had met on her ‘taster day’ last week.  They had joined up with another couple of girls and had got on very well in their twenty minute break.  We stopped off in Bungay on the way home so that I could buy birdseed for my mother and some art equipment for E.  This resulted in my purse being quite a few pounds lighter by the time we got back in the car.  This college business is very expensive! After lunch I realised that I needed some groceries and also had to collect my medication so got back in the car.  It was a lovely afternoon and after I had finished in town and as I was in need of a little quiet reflection time, I drove to Dunwich beach adding another eighteen or so miles to my driving tally for the day. The light was perfect, the breeze light and the air warm and balmy.  I walked on the beach for a while looking at the sea.  My small point-and-shoot camera doesn’t do justice to the colour of the sea which was true aqua-marine and much greener than in the photo. After wandering about on the shingle for a while I then decided to go a little further inland and look at the plants and flowers.  The shingle rises up from the waters edge and then flattens out for a couple of yards.  This is good to walk along when it isn’t too windy as it provides a good view seaward and landward. Beyond this ridge it then descends quite sharply to a lower sheltered area of sand and gravel which then becomes marshland and then woodland.  As the shingle gets further from the sea it supports some hardy plants like Sea-kale (Crambe maritima) and Yellow Horned-poppy (Glaucium flavum).  I was too late to be able to photograph the poppy flowers but the clumps of leaves were everywhere.

Leaves of Yellow Horned-poppy (Glaucium flavum)

All parts of Horned-poppy are poisonous and if they are eaten can affect the brain.  One of my plant reference books quotes from old records a strange story from 1698 concerning the Horned-poppy.  ‘A man made himself a pie of horned poppy roots under the impression that they were the roots of sea holly.  After eating the pie he became delirious and fancied that his white porcelain chamber pot was solid gold.  He broke the pot into bits in the belief that he owned a great treasure’.

Once down off the shingle bank there were many plants to look at.

Prickly Sow-thistle (Sonchus asper)

A bee on Prickly Sow-thistle

Sea Campion (Silene uniflora)

Not a brilliant photo I know, but it shows clearly the similarity between it and Bladder Campion (Silene vulgaris) with the swollen calyx and also shows the grey-green, fleshy almost waxy leaves.

Probably a male Common Green Grasshopper (Omocestus viridulus)

As I walked, grasshoppers were leaping out of the way; there were so many of them.  I tried to photograph one but the shot was not successful.  I was wishing I had brought our better camera with me.

Sea Mayweed (Tripleurospermum maritimum)

Common Restharrow (Ononis repens)

Common Restharrow

This is a very pretty pea flower though, as its name suggests, it wasn’t popular with ploughmen as it has deep roots and matted stems that root as it trails along the ground.  It also taints milk if eaten by cattle.  The leaves when crushed smell a bit like goats do – not nice!  Children in the north of Britain in the past dug up the roots of Restharrow and chewed them like liquorice – another name for this plant is wild liquorice.   The leaves are a little sticky to the touch and have an attractive crimped edge to them. As an aside, while I am typing this (Thursday lunchtime) the field at the back of our house is being harrowed.  I don’t think the large machines of today are much hindered by plants anymore. The weather today is gloomy and misty, as you can see.

Common Bird’s-foot Trefoil (Lotus corniculatus) with Dock seed-head (Rumex obustifolius)

Hare’s-foot Clover (Trifolium arvense)

I love this little plant!  The flowers are so soft and furry and tinged with pink.

Here it is again, growing with Hop Trefoil (Trifolium campestre)

These are either naturalised Michaelmas Daisies (Aster sp.)  or Sea Asters (Aster tripolium).  I cannot identify them properly.

Parsley Water-Dropwort (Oenanthe lachenalii)

The next series of photographs are terrible but with only my small camera with me I couldn’t do any better.  They are of a Humming-bird Hawkmoth (Macroglossum stellatarum) which flies very fast and to the naked eye usually looks like a blur anyway.

Humming-bird Hawkmoth with Sea Campion

Humming-bird Hawkmoth with Sea Campion

Humming-bird Hawkmoth with Sea Campion

I decided it was time to return home and just took two more pictures, this time of the car-park.

These little wooden shacks contain winching gear to enable the fishermen to pull their boats up the steep shingle beach

This is a fish-and-chip café that is so popular that in the summer, coach parties of visitors come to savour its delights

I am finishing this post off on Friday evening.  E has managed to attend college every day this week and though it has not all been at all easy for her she has kept going and has enjoyed a lot of it.  I am exhausted from all the driving I have done and my feet and ankles are very painful.  It has been worth it and I am so pleased with my daughter and very proud of her.

An Afternoon at the Beach

Tags

bumble bees, Dunwich beach, elder trees, little egret, Muntjac deer

I have had a busy week with hardly any time in the garden and no time to add a post to my blog – until now.  The weather has been a little better this week – good for all the young people on their half-term break. 

Wednesday 19th Feb:  A beautiful orange sunrise – a pleasant mild day with lots of cloud and some sunshine.  A returning to Sheffield today so she came with me when I took my mother shopping in Diss.  We took her to the station after getting the groceries and waited with her until just before her train arrived.  She texted later to tell me what a long and unpleasant journey she’d had.  A landslip between Chesterfield and Sheffield meant that she had had to change trains at Nottingham.  Over an hours wait for the new train to arrive and then a long circuitous route to Sheffield avoiding the damaged track.  A dislikes travelling at the best of times – delays make her doubly grumpy (don’t they A?!)

Thursday 20th Feb:  Rain overnight and a cloudy, gloomy, breezy morning.  While R and I were drinking our morning tea we watched a deer wandering through the garden – probably muntjac though might have been roe; couldn’t see clearly.  Heavy rain followed by rain showers today.  Did lots of food shopping and then lots of ironing.  Watched a pair of deer grazing in the field on the other side of the lane at the front of the house.  The sky cleared after dark.

Friday 21st Feb:  A beautiful clear bright morning – almost a frost.  Water droplets had become gel-like but not frozen.  As the sun rose everything shimmered and sparkled – heavenly!  Took Mum to the eye clinic at the Norfolk and Norwich hospital again to have another injection in her eye.

  Poor lady has glaucoma, cataracts and macular degeneration and the injections are for the latter.  Her eyesight was so good until fairly recently.  She now finds reading, knitting, sewing difficult as well as all her household chores.  She it was who taught me to be observant, teaching me when I was tiny the names of flowers and birds.  I remember her showing me how to colour pictures with the natural dyes from grass and flower petals while we were on a camping holiday.  She pointed out bilberries to us all when we were walking across the North York Moors.  All we could see were rabbit droppings at first so that was what we called rabbit droppings ever afterwards.

Surprised at the large number of dead deer at the sides of the road.  Noticed bumble bees flying in the garden this afternoon.

Saturday 22nd Feb:  Another lovely day – more bumble bees about.  I managed to take a few photos of flowers in the garden this morning while R was trying to do something about filling in some of the deep holes and ruts made by the JCB.  The elder tree is coming in to leaf.  I am so pleased we have an elder tree as I love the frothy flowers in mid-summer and the beautiful berries in the autumn.  I really like elderflower cordial and the flowers also go well with gooseberries – they are in season at the same time.  Elder trees are traditionally magical – some traditions have them as evil trees and some as good.  In some parts of the country it was thought best to ask permission of the tree before pruning it or taking anything from it. Boggarts are thought to live in Elder trees.  (I remember reading ‘The Boggart’ by Susan Cooper to A when she was little).  Elders are very useful trees.  Flies do not like their smell so they were often planted near to cottages – larders, kitchens, dairies, outside lavatories!

R and I decided to drive to Dunwich and walk on the beach this afternoon.  It wasn’t as busy as we thought it might have been seeing as the day was so fine.  Lovely rolling waves –  R pointed out the hissing noise the pebbles make as the water recedes before the next wave rushes in.  What a good work-out for leg muscles walking on deep shingle beaches is!  I found a mermaid’s purse,  a dogfish egg case, and gave it to E when I got home.  We saw a little egret fishing in a pool near the shore.  We drove home as the sun was setting – the trees, black silhouettes, showing every twig and growing leaf bud against the pale sky.

Waves on Dunwich beach

 

View out to sea

 

Stonecrop, rope and other bits and pieces above the strand line

 

More waves with a juvenile herring gull

 

A fisherman with the town of Southwold and it’s lighthouse in the distance

 

View inland from the beach

 

Little egret in the pool

 

Little egret again.  Neither of these photos clear as I had to zoom so much to take the picture