Last month it was all about the birdsong. The birds are still loud but they are busy too. They are hunting and scavenging, using all the daylight to feed their nestlings and fledglings. Some are raising a second or third brood. The young rooks are insistent at sunrise, their immature caws and cackles playing a constant soundtrack to the morning.
This month it is the fragrance that assaults the senses from the hedgerows. On warm evenings, honeysuckle stops me in my tracks. It casts a spell. The warm, sweet spice sends me checking for its twirling, twisting stems and peaches and cream flowers. We can choose big and blowsy strains for our gardens in a variety of colours but our beautiful native lonicera periclymenum is perfect for our hedges. It is pollinated by moths and long tongued bees, its perfume sending a chemical message throughout the countryside. Dormice eat the flowers and use its bark for nesting and in the autumn it provides a feast of bright berries for thrushes and finches.
Wild privet (ligustrum vulgare) produces creamy flowers with a clean, bold scent. Sweet dog rose (rosa canina) uses her long thorns to scramble and twine. Her scent is faint and exotic. Buddleia, rampant and invasive, has a honey scent which draws the butterflies to her like a flickering, animated cloak. If you are lucky enough to walk beneath lime trees (tilia) in flower the perfume is intoxicating and lingers long in the memory. Also known as linden trees, limes occur in fairy groves and ancient tales. Their flowers can be used to make a palatable, protective tea; they produce drippy, sticky sap, but no limes!
However, the queen of the hedgerow is definitely the elder tree (sambucus). Her tightly packed, lacy flowers produce waves of bright, fresh, citrus scent, announcing the arrival of summer.
I pushed open the door of the pharmacy and walked into the dark shop, searching for citric acid. 'Don't worry', called a voice from the back, 'I ordered extra this month'.
It is cordial season.
We will pick bunches of the cream clusters of flowers, disturbing a buzzing, thrumming cloud of insects. Back home we will twist the flowers from the stalks and macerate them in sugar syrup along with thick curls of lemon peel. The perfume will fill the house and the next day we can strain it, stir in the citric acid, and decant into tall bottles. Summer is bottled.
In the pharmacy, the girl behind the counter said with reverence, 'did you know, you can get Elderflower Prosecco'? Summer in a glass, I'll drink to that!
