Ramblings

February 2023


Thursday – Bodenham Lake – The flooding south of Leominster has subsided and the fields look fresh and green again. Into Bodenham car park. House Sparrows chase between the bushes. Robins are singing in every direction. A Wood Pigeon coos. A Song Thrush joins the songsters. A Chaffinch flies along the hedge by the track. Everything looks dormant, the only leaves are tatty, browning Brambles. Old Man’s Beard is still fluffy but grey.

The water level in the lake remains high and little of the islands are exposed. Mallard gather beside one out in the boating area. Willow branches blaze yellow from a distance. A Green Woodpecker yaffles in Westfield Wood from where a GoldeneyeCommon Buzzard soars out to circle the fields. A Blackbird sings fitfully. The donkeys in the paddock bray loudly at my passing by. A pair of cock Ring-necked Pheasants are beside the hide. The scrape is completely submerged as is most of the reed bed. A pair of Tufted Duck are out on the water, but little else. A Goosander flies in. A couple of Canada Geese are by the island. A Jay lumbers across to the island trees, where there is an absence of Cormorants. On the western end are a Great Crested Grebe, drake Goldeneye and the Great White Egret. Seven Wigeon are on the south side. A Grey Heron flaps across the lake. Four Goosander fly out of the east, circle and head back eastwards out of sight. A Cormorant flies in and swims slowly with its bill pointing high. Seventy plus noisy Canada Geese fly in in several skeins. This brings eight Cormorants out of a corner and into the trees.

Back through the meadow. Several Redwings and Fieldfares fly off. A couple of Ravens fly out from the woods. There are more winter thrushes in the cider orchard.

Friday – Stourbridge – A mild, but grey morning. Into Mary Stevens Park which contains Heath Pool. The park was the gift of Ernest Stevens, opened to the public in 1931. The pool was created by Benjamin Pratt as a millpond for Gig Mill the Withy Brook feeds the pool. Gig Mill produce Clough and wool products from the 1600s was later adapted to produce iron. Some noisy Canada Geese and a large number of gulls, main Black-headed, are on the water. Mallard and Coot are also present. Overlooking the pool is Studley Court, now municipal offices. The house has been despoiled by unsightly additions. It was formerly known as Heath House. The first reference on the site dates from 1691. It was run as a V.A.D. Military Hospital during the World War 1. The building became a Convent School during the 1920s. It became the offices for what was then the Stourbridge District Council in the 1930s. It was used until Stourbridge merged with Dudley Borough in 1974. Since 1974, Studley Court has been home to parts of Dudley MBC. Through a magnificent set of gates onto Heath Lane erected by Ernest Stevens.

Into Worcester Street. A row of cottages on the junction are dated 1838. Many other houses in the street are later, often Churchmodern in-fills. A large Baptist church dating from 1836 stands in Chapel Street. A ginnel leads down to New Road. The ginnel emerges beside New Road Methodist church. There has been a Methodist church operating on this site since 1805. The schoolroom block was built and opened in 1886. The church was built in 1928. Houses opposite are fine Georgian buildings, now all business premises. A short distance along the road is the Catholic church of Our Lady and All Saints. A mission church was built on this site in 1824. The Revd Walter Keen was the incumbent from 1842 until his death in 1877. He raised the subscriptions to build the present church, which was built in 1863-4, by Edward Welby Pugin. The tower by G.H. Cox was added 1886. Revd Keen is buried in front of the Lady Altar. There is a fine east window which, like all the glass in the church, is by Hardman & Co of Birmingham. A carved reredos behind the High Altar represents the Annunciation. The walls of the sanctuary are painted to resemble tiles. Side chapels have statues, Mary in the Lady Chapel and St Joseph in his chapel. High up in the windows of the sanctuary are statues of St George and St Patrick.

Opposite is an impressive building, the former Police Station. The main police station was built in 1911 as the headquarters of the Worcestershire County Constabulary but parts of the building date back to 1885. Along to another junction. Traffic is heavy, multi-laned road carving up the town. The Free Library and Technical Institute stands on the junction, a fine red brick and red tiled building built in 1904 with money provided by the famous American industrialist, Andrew Carnegie. In Church Street is a mid 18th century building, now tatty offices. Nearby is a short terrace of substantial houses in red brick dated 1885. In Hagley Road is the mid 19th century County Court, now solicitors’ offices. In the opposite direction around the large junction is St John the Evangelist, United Reform church, now used by a theatre company. Built in 1861 by GE Street, the east end was tiled over sandstone blocks but many tiles have now come off. It closed as a church in 2017.

Nearby is the fire station. On the other side of the church is the railway and bus stations. The bus station is a modern glass construction partly occupying the location of the original Stourbridge railway station which was demolished in 1979. Until 1967 the railway line continued to Stourbridge Canal Basin when this section of the line was closed and subsequently lifted. The railway station is a small modern brick building. It is the terminus of Stourbridge Town Branch Line, at less Clock Towerthan one mile long is reputedly the shortest branch line in Europe. By the entrance to the interchange is a bright steel and bronze statue of a glass blower by John McKenna. A subway leads to the town centre. A bank is a late 18th century house. Opposite Bordeaux House, dated 1894, has an ornate frieze and a lot of buddleia. An empty shop has three curved windows on the ground floor and three bay windows on alcoves on the upper floor. The street is a mixture of late Victorian and modern buildings. The Post Office is an ornate red building of 1885. A bank is another ornate building with a shield on the portico with swags and a bee hive and the date 1765, (this may be a reference to the foundation of Lloyds Bank rather than the age of the building which looks like late 19th century). The Talbot Hotel is closed, a Georgian coaching inn with an entrance for coaches. Many shops here have ceased trading, many others are charity shops, takeaways and beauty services. At the end of the street is a late 19th century clock tower outside the former market hall of 1827. Opposite is a former bank, late Victorian. On the other corner is the former Board House, early 18th century.

In Market Street is the Town Hall of 1887, by Thomas Robinson another High Victorian building in red brick, seemingly disused. Along the road is an Art Deco Institute and Social Club. The Town Hall is in a modern mall. On down the High Street. The Scala cinema is a fitness centre. Opposite is King Edward VI College. Back up to Market Street. The Bell stands on the junction with Bell Street, occupying a large 1930s building. However it looks closed. Beside it is the church of St Thomas. A row of shops are in late 18th century buildings. Market Street ends at New Road. Back along Worcester Road towards Mary Stevens Park. Side streets are a mixture of terraces, presumably for the workers, with the occasional large Victorian house. Some streets have a few “in-between” houses, double fronted but much smaller than the grand “bosses’” houses.

Through the gates of the park and down the main avenue. A war memorial had bronze panels and a statue of Victorious Peace by John Cassidy on top. A bandstand was manufactured by Hill & Smith Ltd of Brierley Hill. The avenue leads down to a large children’s playground and the Pool. Two pairs of Muscovy ducks are on the bank along with a couple of Moorhens. Route

Sunday – Leominster – A red glow lightens the sky above Eaton Hill on a cold, icy morning. The pressure has risen to 1031mB. The sky is clear. There are few bird calls in the street, an occasional chack from a Jackdaw or coo from a Wood Pigeon. Over a frosty railway bridge. Lammas Meadow is white in the shade and yellow where the sun alights. A Dipper is singing on a small log by the river bank. The water level in the River Lugg has fallen considerably. Easters Meadow is pale with frost. A Song Thrush Snowdropssings. A Great Tit calls further downstream. A Great Spotted Woodpecker moves between the balls of Mistletoe high in a riverside Black Poplar. Another Great Spotted Woodpecker flies into the Poplar causing a rumpus and the two chase about the tree before the interloper departs.

Into Pinsley Mill. The now regular Dunnock song rings across from the other side of the railway tracks. There Blue Tits flit from tree to tree. Snowdrops – Maids of February – are coming into flower along the edge of the churchyard. The leaves of Wild Arum are unfurling. Daffodil leaves and a few flower heads have appeared among the snowdrops. The water level in the River Kenwater has also fallen considerably. The sneering call of a Greenfinch comes from trees along the edge of Pinsley Mead. Another calls in trees beside the east end of the Priory church.

Home – I continue to clear the Bramble in the far corner of the garden. Cutting it back and chopping it into small pieces to bag is back-breaking work. Much of the small, in thickness, canes are now cut off. Many were several yards long. Next week the large main stems will be trimmed back. The canes will grow back rapidly in summer, hopefully giving another fine crop of blackberries. Stems have shot up from the curly Hazel, all straight. There are also numerous new stems from the willow we had removed a couple of years ago. All these are removed, about sixty or seventy of them! It is not easy as I have to concentrate on avoiding treading on snowdrops or nascent bluebells.

Wednesday – Bodenham Lake – The temperature has failed to rise above freezing as fog envelops the land. Pavements are slick with ice. At Bodenham all is rimed with frost and faded in the mist. House Sparrows chatter and a Robin sings. Jackdaws call from the direction of the village. Little of the lake can be seen through the mist. I see little point in going round to the hide. Goldfinches twitter in the orchard hedgerow. Redwings and Fieldfares are in the orchard, the latter calling harshly at my passing. There are Blackbirds on the ground whilst Blue Tits and Great Tits flit between the trees. Chaffinches and Greenfinches fly up into the hedge between the orchards. Canada Geese can be heard in the distance arriving from the fields. A Robin burbles a short burst of song from the lower limbs of an apple tree.

Sunday – Leominster – No frost today. House Sparrows are getting more excited as Spring approaches and their volume rises. Collared Doves, Wood Pigeons and Jackdaws all call. Over the railway bridge. Here the songs are from Chaffinch and Mistle Thrush. Onto Butts Bridge. The water level in the River Lugg continues to fall and the water is now clear but much more turbulent as it reacts to the large stones on the river bed. The Dipper is a short distance downstream on the railings that hold stones placed to prevent erosion. Blue Tits squeak in the trees. The Dipper flies up stream to a water level post which peeps out of the water.

Back over the bridge. A Dunnock sings outside the White Lion. Into Pinsley Mill. Rooks caw as they fly overhead. Jackdaws clamour in one of the great Black Poplars by the river. Dunnocks, Wood Pigeons, Chaffinches, Robins and Blackbirds are in the bushes on the far side of the railway track. A Greenfinch sings from the top of a tree at the foot of the churchyard. More Snowdrops have come to flower and the carpets of green and white are extensive now.

Into the Peace Garden. A Common Buzzard flies out of a tree and off over the railway. The River Kenwater is also silt free and clear. A pair of Magpies stalk the grass at the west end of the Priory church. The large flock of Feral Pigeons circles the town before coming to rest on roofs in Church Street. A Great Tit calls in the tree outside the Forbury, a very large house that is now a residential home. A Starling sings from its chimney pot.

Tuesday – Home – A Tawny Owl is hooting somewhere behind the house.

Solihull – In Shirley Heath, an area of mid to late 20th century housing estates. The whole of this part of the country is covered in fog. The name Shirley means either “a bright clearing” or “a border clearing”, the clearing being in the Forest of Aden which covered this whole area. There was an Iron Age hill-fort, Berry Mound, to the south west of here. The forest of Arden was part of the Kingdom of Mercia and a settlement known as the manor of Ulverlei, meaning “Wulfhere’s clearing” was established, with its centre north east of the hillfort at Shirley. Wulfhere was the first Christian King of all Mercia. Ulverlei became the property of Leofric, Earl of Mercia. It passed to Leofric’s grandson, Edwin, Earl of Mercia who held it until his death in 1071. The lands were then granted to the Norman Ralph de Limesy who founded the settlement of Solihull as a “planted borough” or planned village to the south of Ulverli. The de Limsey family held the Manor of Solihull, until Ralph’s great-granddaughter married Hugh de Odingsells. By 1295, the Manor of Solihull had passed from the Odingsells via heiress to the de Birmingham family, however they in turn quickly passed it into the Le Despencer family. The Despensers were in and out of favour with the crown for many years. In 1400, Thomas Despenser, 1st Earl of Gloucester died a traitor for his part in the Epiphany Rising, and so the Crown took custody of the manor. The manor often changed hands until modern times. Solihull became a small market town. In 1894, Solihull (including the parishes of Shirley, Baddesley Clinton, Barston, Lapworth, Balsall, Bushwood, Elmdon, Knowle, Nuthurst, Packwood and Tanworth-in-Arden) was made into the Solihull Rural District in the county of Warwickshire. It is now administered by Solihull Metropolitan Borough Council, effectively a unitary authority providing the majority of local government services.

On to Marshall Lake Road. A century ago much of the area was farmland. A large building is the Shirley Club. Along the road past housing covering the whole of the 20th and some 21st century. This is now Blossomfield Road. A large house, Wircester Manor is dated 2006. A house, Edwardian at the latest, stands beside a gated development. It must have stood in splendid isolation once as everything else is mid 20th century. A Great Tit calls. This area is called Blossomfield. Now the buildings are blocks of flats and housing estates from the second half of the 20th century. Another pair of early 20th century houses are in the middle of these later buildings. The old maps show more Victorian houses here but they seem to have been demolished. A Robin is in full flow. Into Dingle Lane. Across the road is Alderbrook School, set in extensive playing fields. This side are three storey blocks of flats, then a house with a plaque, M&L 1877. Now back to three storey flats. Opposite is Tudor Grange Academy. Magpies chatter in roadside Oaks. Gulls fly around the school fields. A Pied Wagtail struts along the pavement.

Dingle Lane ends at Whitefields Road, which marks the boundary between Blossomfield and Hillfield. A large estate is opposite. Through Whitefields Gate following a public footpath through the estate. The footpath enters a small wood at the head of a small lake, Chelveston Crescent Pond, whose end is lost in the mist. Coot, Mallard and a pair of Common Gulls are on the water. Long-tailed Tits buzz in the trees. Back out into the late 20th century housing Hillfield Hallestates. The footpath end at Monkspath Hall Road. Into another modern housing estate. Through cul-de-sacs linked by paths to Hillfield Road, now called Fielding Lane after the name of a family that occupied the Hillfield Hall.

A large pond is called Hillfield Hall but the large house is cut off by modern housing. Older buildings are nearer the hall. The road leading to the building is private and on the site of a moat, although nothing seems to remain of this. The hall is dated 1576 with initials of owner and wife, William and Ursula Eaves. The west front is original, but the remainder was partly rebuilt after a fire in 1867. It is built in red brick, with a tiled roof with a crowstep gable, flanked by pair of castellated narrow towers. It was converted into a restaurant in 1974 before re -emerging as a pub called The Stables until 1999 when it was converted to kitchens and the main hall became a pub and restaurant. The whole complex was closed in 2002 for conversion to apartments. On along Hillfield Road. A Nuthatch calls in the trees along with several Wood Pigeons. Into Alderminster Road. The modern housing estates continue. One can only imagine the hours of council committee meetings trying to decide what to call the dozens and dozens of Drives, Crescents and Closes. Into Widney Lane. Across the road there is a near dry moat surrounding a heavily wooded piece of land.

My hips and back are beginning to complain, so I head back towards Shirley Heath. The road is lined with more modern estates. It crosses Monkspath Hall Road beside a large modern pub. A large cottage had some age, possibly 18th century with an earlier core. A short distance on is a cottage that looks like the gatehouse to an estate. It is probably late 18th or 19th century. The road now passes mid 20th century detached houses. Tennis courts are on the edge of Hillfield Park. A small, unkempt Abel's Farmwoodland, Parish Poles, is behind a high fence. Abel’s Farm is likely to date to the late 16th century as evidenced by the surviving timber framing. The building is shown on the 1886 Ordnance Survey map as a range oriented west-east fronting Widney Lane with a small extension at the centre of the range abutting to the rear. Modern extensions have been added. On the wall is a cast iron plaque stating the County Borough of Solihull, and declaring horse riding or the parking or the driving of vehicles on this road margin is prohibited. Next to the farmhouse is a later, probably Victorian house.

Back to the inter-war detached houses on one side of the road and the modern estates on the other. Two Carrion Crows are unhappy about a Lesser Black-backed Gull on a roof. The gull is totally disinterested. Modern houses now where almost every inch outside had been paved over. Back into Marshall Lake Road. Across the junction was Featherstone’s Grave Wood. I can find nothing about this lost wood other than it was painted by artist Thomas Viola (born circa 1929) around 1950. Back at the car, I reflect on the walk which was largely through modern estates. Although I would prefer to be in historic surroundings, these estates are where millions of our people live and are as much a part of England as the villages of timber-framed houses around a church. Route

Friday – Leominster – Last night a crescent moon flanked by Jupiter and Venue hung in the western sky. This morning I am still struggling with a cold I have had for a week now. It is really debilitating. I manage to get out to do a bit of shopping. West Street is closed to traffic and the surface of tiles has been lifted and planed down. I do not know what new surface is going to be laid down but hopefully it will be a great improvement of what has been here previously – not that that will be difficult.

Home – There are clumps of snowdrops all over the garden. The orchard is particularly beautiful. The first crocuses and daffodils are coming into flower. I have sown several large pots with broad beans and put them in the greenhouse. Potatoes have been placed in the summerhouse to chit. Indoors, chillies have germinated along with a tray of lettuces. Hopefully, more seeds will get sown this weekend. The management of the brambles needs to be continued but there is pressure on indoors. The builders have finished and walls need painting before the plumber returns to fit new radiators.

Sunday – Leominster – The sky is cloudless and the sun had already risen above Eaton Hill. A slight, cold breeze disturbs the flag on the Council offices. Wood Pigeons are on the roofs. A pair of Jackdaws examine a chimney. A supermarket delivery van is already out on its rounds. A house that has seemed empty for years now not only had new windows but a roof of solar panels. Over the railway and onto Butts Bridge. The water level in the River Lugg has fallen again slightly. The resident Dipper flies along to the depth gauge sticking out of the water, then off upstream. Robins and a Song Thrush sing. Blue Tits flit through the trees.

Back past the White Lion. A Magpie chatters as it flies over towards the Minster. Into the Millennium orchard. A Robin is singing from one of the dessert apple trees. The tree has had wood shavings spread around its base but it is in need of a drastic pruning, having dozens of thin branches. A Raven makes a strange yelping call from the top of a conifer in the churchyard. Another flies over, croaking and the first follows it. Most trees on the park are still dormant but fresh leaves have appeared on a Buddleia. The first shoots of Ramsons have thrust up through the soil. The first daffodils are in Celandinesflower. The River Kenwater flows slower now.

Into the churchyard. Greenfinches call from the trees. Blackbirds squabble in the bushes. Chasing and Blue Tits fly from tree to tree. Five Grey Squirrels are digging at the foot of a Yew. The bell-ringers start their warm-up. A Magpie, the one seen earlier possibly, is at the top of an Ivy clad tree. A few Celandines are in flower.

Home – A tray of tomatoes are sown. I need some more tumbling types to put in hanging baskets – the packet was empty! However, Red Alert, a bush variety, Silvery Fir Tree, Green Evergreens and an unknown beefsteak variety are now in the bath room where a decent number of chillies have now germinated.