Old Chestnuts

It's that time of year when the Horse Chestnut trees send forth their floral delights. These contrasting specimens are on the corner of Newland Avenue and Cottingham Road but you can find them spread all over town. Only the white ones produce conkers of any usable size. For some unfathomable reason these are sometimes known as Buckeyes in America ... there's even a fetid buckeye which sounds truly delightful.

Margot took this.

Taking liberties

So I go to see that old tree as I always do when I'm around the Westwood and I found it surrounded by cars. There's usually a couple of cars parked here, people visiting the place and that's no problem but the other day I counted sixty or so cars on this stretch and I doubt there were sixteen people on the Westwood that afternoon. Clearly the place has become a 'free' car park for people working in the town. I could see there's damage to the road edge and footpath so this is going to cause trouble sooner or later. I read somewhere that cars spend over 90% of the time parked up and I guess they have to go somewhere but on the local beauty spot? Surely not. 

The Weekend in Black and White is here.

Decay

The good folks of City Daily Photo have chosen as today's theme the 'Beauty of Decay'. Easy I thought just point my camera just about anywhere in Hull and click. It's all around me this decay malarkey but then on second thoughts there's hardly any beauty in it and the shabbiness that could be mistaken for decay is really mindless economic neglect. No, real decay leads to something new, it's a transformation, a recycling; it has a purpose. So it's back to nature and besides it's prettier than any tatty building in Hull.

A few years ago this  large tree, I think it was a horse chestnut, was felled on Beverley Westwood. Instead of clearing it away in some fastidious manner it was simply left lying. Over the years fungi and insects will no doubt eat it away and I will no doubt take pictures of them doing so.

 

Underneath the spreading chestnut tree

The Westwood, Beverley