LandScape Mar/Apr 2014

The blossom bowl of England

New life on the farm

Fresh flavours of the season

Magnolias | Tulip garden | Wild garlic | Custard | Make a kite | Severn Bore | Hurdle makers | Newborn animals | Cherry blossom | Shakespeare’s Stratford

Welcome spring

Mar / Apr 2014

Issue 14 | Mar / Apr 2014 | £3.99

LandScape - Life at nature’s pace

www.landscapemagazine.co.uk

Mar / Apr 2014 £3.99

Life at nature’s pace

Border auricula ‘Old Irish Blue’.

Taking centre stage Primula auriculas are the aristocrats of the primula family, coveted by collectors and displayed in their own theatres

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iminutive primula auriculas combine velvety, sumptuous texture with heady yet refined colour on blooms of dainty symmetry. The flowers, held on a short fleshy stem in poised clusters, are unmistakably part of the primrose family. It is their scalloped petals and picotee shading that mark them out as something exceptional.

It is a simple hybrid between two Alpine primroses, Primula auricula and Primula hirsuta. However, no flower is more covetable to a serious horticultural collector. Enthusiasts display and cosset them like fine china.

It is the combination of vivid colour with black that makes auriculas so singular. The eye of the open flower is often ringed with a flash of absolute black. This enhances the brightness of the surrounding edge colour and the inner golden eye.

Many auriculas have a downy coating of fine, white or creamy powder on their flowers and leaves. This is known as farina, from the Latin for flour or meal. This dust is a characteristic found in many primula species and sometimes it’s scented. In auriculas it becomes an arresting facet of the plant’s beauty. Collectors prize this delicate coating and have selected and bred for more. Some auriculas have a dense, paste-like ›

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Bells of blue The delicate urn-shaped bells of the grape hyacinth breathe new life into the home and garden

Nature’s nest A clutch of speckled quails eggs are crowned by a circle of grape hyacinth bulbs, sap-filled lengths of new hedge growth and fluffy pheasant feathers. With bulbs intact grape hyacinths can last for weeks out of water.

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Preserving bulbs Grape hyacinths, also known as muscari, contain all the nutrients and energy they need to flower inside their bulbs. This means they can be successfully grown with just the provision of water. To grow hyacinths in glass jam jars, place the bulbs into a shallow layer of aquarium carbon. This is used in fish tanks and will keep the water fresh. The carbon layer should be kept moist but the water level should stay below the base of the bulb.

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Sweet custard This simple dish is easily transformed into delicious desserts

Ginger burnt cream Serves 4 450ml double cream 6 egg yolks 60g golden icing sugar 2 pieces stem ginger, plus 1 tbsp of syrup from the jar golden caster sugar

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Place the cream in a saucepan and heat gently until almost boiling.

Place the egg yolks in a heatproof bowl with the icing sugar. Beat with a balloon whisk to combine then gradually whisk in the hot cream. Stir in the stem ginger syrup. Place the bowl over a pan of hot water and cook, stirring continuously until the mixture thickens.

Chop the stem ginger finely and divide between 4 ramekin dishes.

Top with the cream mixture and chill for at least 2 hours. Sprinkle the caster sugar evenly over the tops and place under a very hot grill to caramelise the sugar. Chill for another 1-2 hours before serving.

Traditional custard 4 free range eggs

300ml double cream

100g golden caster sugar

300ml full-fat milk

1 tsp cornflour, optional

1 vanilla pod

Separate the eggs, placing the yolks in a large bowl. Add the sugar to the egg yolks and whisk until pale and thick. Add the cornflour and whisk well to incorporate into the egg yolks. Put the cream and milk into a saucepan. Cut the vanilla pod open lengthways and scrape out the seeds with the back of a knife, then add to the milk and cream. Heat the cream mixture to just below boiling point. Take the vanilla pod out. Slowly pour the hot cream and milk onto the eggs and sugar, whisking as you go.

Transfer the custard to a clean pan, and set it over a very low heat.

Stir the custard constantly with a wooden spoon, until it is steaming and has thickened slightly. The custard is ready when it is possible to draw a clear line through it on the back of the wooden spoon. This can take up to 10 mins.

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Owners hold on to their hounds, at the trail start line.

Racing away Hound trailers gather on a Cumbrian fellside to enjoy a long-established rural sport

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or 200 years, the sight of a string of lithe hounds racing freely over the fells has surprised visitors and delighted residents of this remote part of Britain. These are not foxhounds and this is not hunting. It is hound trailing, a sport unique to Cumbria, North Yorkshire, the Scottish Borders and Ireland.

Hounds are trained to follow an aniseed trail across 10 miles of countryside, with no guidance from owners.

Lined up at the start line, they quiver with anticipation. Their yips and barks grow louder and more urgent, as they wait for what is termed the slip. This is the moment their owner lets slip the tight hold they had on their hound.

When the starting flag is dropped, the eager hounds shoot away. Over the next 30 to 45 minutes, they race across fell and farmland. They tear over fields, through herds of sheep, over drystone walls and hedges, even flying over barbed wire fences. As they approach the finish, knots of people shout, whistle and bang tins to encourage them on.

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It is said that the first race stemmed from an argument over a pint between two owners of foxhound packs back in the 18th century. They decided to test the packs against each other to see which was the fastest.

Since those early days, this has been a gambling sport with hefty wagers laid on the competing hounds.

In 1901 an article in Baily’s Magazine of Sports and Pastimes said: “The miners and dalesmen, requiring some form of sport, had selected one of the north-country foxhounds – the speediest type of hound that knows a fox – and by crossing and re-crossing have obtained an animal little short of a greyhound for pace, and as hungry for an aniseed drag as it is possible to imagine.”

The hound trailing season starts on 1 April and runs through to the end of October. At the end of the season, the hound with most wins becomes the Champion for that season.

Since 1906 trails have been organised by the Hound Trailing Association (HTA).

Originally, there was just the one ›

Hounds display their agility as they sail over obstacles at at the start of a race up Skiddaw and Lonscale Fell in the Northern Lake District.

Once he’s started a trail, the trained hound will race through any obstacle including water.

The hounds have no need for this stile to cross a drystone wall.

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Working by candlelight, brick-maker Tony Mugridge takes clay from a trolley before placing it in a mould.

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Each handmade brick has its own individual appearance, formed by the lumps and impurities in the clay.

Brick by brick The centuries-old tradition of making bricks by hand is being kept alive in a Shropshire gorge

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Roaming free After a gap of several hundred years, wild boar are once again living in British forests

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arly morning in the Forest of Dean, the passing of the March Equinox finally tips Britain from winter into spring. Amongst the snowdrops and lesser celandines, which carpet the woodland floor with their early blooms, a group of animals forage for food. They are wild boars, creatures that used to roam freely through British woods and forests. By the year 1300 however, hunting had driven them to extinction.

A few semi-domesticated boars remained in English forests until Tudor times, but they failed to thrive, and by 1600 they had disappeared from Britain. Yet since the 1990s, wild boars have been thriving in Gloucestershire’s Forest of Dean, Ashdown Forest on the Kent-East Sussex border and in Dorset. There are also smaller groups in Devon and Monmouthshire. Several hundred of these animals are now living in the wild.

The wild boar is the ancestor of the domestic pig. It is so close genetically that the two animals can, and frequently do, interbreed. Their ability to live in both temperate and tropical climate zones makes them one of the world’s most widespread and successful large mammals.

In Britain, wild boars are one of the largest and heaviest land mammals. Males reach a height of 170cm at the shoulder and a length of almost two metres, while females are substantially smaller. A particularly large male can weigh up to 175kg. This is more than twice the average weight of an adult human being, and over 10 times the typical weight of a much more common woodland mammal, the badger.

Adult wild boars look very different from their domestic descendants, in both colour and shape. They are powerfully built animals, with a large head and huge, muscular shoulders. This gives them a ‘front-heavy’ appearance. They are dark rather than pink in colour, and their coat is made up of a thick layer of bristles. The layer becomes thicker during the autumn and winter to protect them against the cold. Both male and female have a thicker line of bristles running from their neck down to the middle of their backs. ›

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Photography: GAP Photos; FLPA; Food & Foto; FLPA; Richard Faulks

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DELICIOUS CHERRY RECIPES ORANGE TIP butterflies

Making rose petal confetti A message to new

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