Wild flowers, lapwings and
Water Voles in a large field across the road from our house. I used to watch the lapwings displaying for hours from my bedroom window, and come home from playing around the stream with mud everywhere and leeches attached to my socks.
My early "knowledge" of wild flowers came from the Cicely Mary Barker books of flower fairies, which my aunt bought me when I was about 8 years old. I used to bring bluebells home from the fields (knew no better then
) and insisted on having them kept for days, drooping and stinking, in a vase in the living room.