The blackcap - the "mock nightingale"
The blackcap is a grey warbler, easily identified by its distinctive cap. Males have black caps (as the name suggests), while the female’s cap is chestnut brown.
Six Things on
The Ridgeway - walking in the footsteps of the ancients
The Ridgeway is an ancient trackway described as Britain's oldest road running from Wiltshire to the Thames at Streatley. It has been extended to Ivinghoe Beacon in the Chilterns to form an 87 mile National Trail.
College Farm, Finchley - north London model home of the first bottled milk
The first ever bottled milk in the UK was produced in 1884, at College Farm in Finchley, North London, run by Express Dairies and regarded as one of the 'model farms' of the time and thereafter.
Lacock Abbey, the birthplace of photography
The pale gold stones of Lacock Abbey had already seen 600 years of human history when William Henry Fox Talbot took a photo of a small window there in 1835, creating the earliest surviving photographic negative.
Atropa belladonna - Deadly Nightshade
The Deadly Nightshade is found mainly on chalky soils, in scrub and woodland. Its shiny black berries are highly poisonous to humans, though some mammals and birds can eat them.
Battle of Sedgemoor - a failed coup
The Battle of Sedgemoor marked the climactic failure of the Monmouth Rebellion in the 17th century, wherein the Duke of Monmouth (an illegitimate son of Charles II) unsuccessfully rallied supporters in the South West of England to try to overthrow King James II.
Six things to delight and entertain you every day.