Now that the grass has grown longer and the flowers spread more widely it?s easy to miss the flourishing of new springtime growth,. I wonder how many people spotted the orchid in the verge by the vestry, or theSolomon?s seal with its small white bells hanging from an arching stem, in The Garden of Remembrance and Thanksgiving near the Leopold Street entrance? (Its name, apparently, comes from the scars on the stem where leaves have dropped, looking, according to medieval Jewish tradition, like the sixth seal on Solomon?s ring, some of them in a pentagonal star of David shape). Now, at the end of June, the tall blue spikes of flowers on the hairyViper?s Bugloss seen near the Benson memorial provide pollen and nectar for bees, hoverflies and butterflies. That area has now become a wildlife meadow, with all sorts of hidden treasures providing food for butterfly caterpillars, thanks to the regular strimming that keeps down the most vigorous grasses. For more than two months of lock-down the team who usually maintain the churchyard couldn?t work, but now restrictions have eased and we?ve been able to resume work in small teams on different days. Some fine photos of the churchyard were taken by Anna Eden and added to a video of local gardens on Divinity Road?s Virtual Open Gardens Day, on 14 June, enabling us to share our beautiful wild churchyard with people who weren?t able to visit in person.
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