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This is the wild flower my blog is named for - Codlins & Cream, or to give it its official name, Greater Willowherb. Photographed on a recent walk (2 weeks ago) round the lanes, which I bitterly regretted before I'd even got half way as I was starting to feel decidedly off-colour. Ah well, the photographs made up for the tiredness I felt when I got home!
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Had I been feeling idle, I could have cut across the fields here and joined the lane two fields away.
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Looking across to Black Mountain and Pen-y-Fan beyond and hidden in the heat-haze.
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One of the neighbours has several donkey brood mares and foals.
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Slightly out of order as this is heading back towards our house (I stopped at the top of the hill to look back).
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Above and below: these two were in a separate field and took an interest in me as I walked by.
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Part of the brood mare band. These are Section D's (Welsh Cobs).
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A chocolate dun mare and her foal which is currently cream, but will probably darken up quite a bit.
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Isn't she gorgeous? Little sharp pony ears and a generous eye, and lots of room for a cunning pony brain!
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Foaly is really quite a chunky little chap.
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It was a hot and humid afternoon and I was glad to be walking DOWN the hill. However, I was thinking that the rest of the walk was flattish - I'd forgotten a couple of significant uphill stretches which had me puffing and stopping to draw breath!
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St Johns Wort - I think it was the square-stemmed variety rather than perforate - and Wood Sage on a steep bank near Colomendy.
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Purple Betony and the less common White variety growing on a sunny bank.
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A thorough mixture of wild flowers in this old sward - Musk Mallow, Self Heal, Hawkbit, Common Centaury, Betony, Buttercups etc.
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Musk Mallow growing on old grassland.
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The "lump" in the middle of this photo is all that remains of a Norman motte and bailey, put here to control our river valley. Before that, I believe that there was a small Iron Age promontary fort there prior to the Normans.
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It was too hazy to see the cairns on the top of the mynydd.
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Having lived here for so long now, I am confess sometimes I have taken our surroundings for granted, but on a day like this was the scenery reminds me how lucky we are to live in such a lovely spot.
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This yellow Toadflax reminds me of my childhood as it used to grow along the edge of our garden, on a wild plot of land which abutted it. When I was 6 and was given the Observer's Book of Wild Flowers by my dad, it was one of the first flowers I learned to identify.
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On the way home, looking across the fields basking in the sunshine.