Wagpies

After days of storms and wind, it's nice to have some clear and fresh days. The wind agitates me and it seems to send the kids at school mad too, what we teachers call (somewhat unimaginatively) 'windy day syndrome'.

The advantage of working at a school on top of a hill is that you get a view, and as views go, ours ain't bad. This biro landscape is the view looking west-ish, towards Pudsey, of the bear fame. I'm not religious, sorry, but the church on the horizon is a frequent comfort.

There's the odd addition now and then but magpies, pied wagtails, crows and black-headed gulls make up my usual bird list from my window at work. Nathan (at 3 y.o.) can already identify these at home, however, he does struggle a bit with magpies and pied wagtails. He gets round this by calling them 'wagpies', which I like far better than the other confusion species terms I've heard, such as shagorant, willowchiff and commic tern.

Variegation

holly leaf
Originally uploaded by wherethewolvesare.

I trust everyone had a happy christmas and I hope everyone has a peaceful new year.

We took the decorations down yesterday, this variegated holly leaf is from the wreath we had on the door. I particularly liked the burnt umber tips to each spike.

Variegation in plants is an interesting thing. Usually, it's not that a mutant seedling arises with variegated leaves but that a single branch, on an otherwise normal plant, grows with variegated leaves. If this branch is spotted by a sharp-eyed observer, a cutting can be taken and grown into an entirely variegated plant, and ad infinitum until everyone has one in their garden! The gardener has to be equally observant, as normal branches can appear on the variegated plant and cause the whole plant to revert to normality (however unimpressive that might be) unless they are swiftly cut out.

In terms of natural selection, a variegated plant is less 'fit' as it has less chlorophyll in it's leaves and, hence, less ability to make food (by photosynthesis) than a normal plant. Science lesson over.

Now what I'd really like is a normal, un-variegated spider plant, if such a thing exists.