Your photos from across West Midlands: Sunshine and flowers
We love to feature your photographs showing the beauty of the West Midlands and here are some of the best from the past week.Upload your images via BBC Weather Watchers or email us at midlandstoday@bbc.co.uk.For inspiration, view some top tips from three of England's Big Picture photographers.
When emailing pictures, please make sure you include the following information:The full name of the person who took the pictures (as this person owns the copyright)Confirmation that the copyright holder gives permission for the BBC to use their pictures across all its outputsThe location, date and time the pictures were takenYour telephone number so we can get back to you if we have any further questions.Any other details about the pictures that may be useful for us to know
Follow for more pictures on Instagram from BBC Birmingham, BBC Coventry & Warwickshire, BBC Hereford & Worcester, BBC Shropshire, BBC Stoke & Staffordshire and BBC Wolverhampton & Black Country.
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The Independent
10 hours ago
- The Independent
Experts reveal 10 things you can do to keep your lawn lush in summer
The summer can be hard on your lawn - and by the end of the season, you may well be wondering if you'll have any grass left. Children and animals can cause havoc - with toys, sandpits and paddling pools taking up significant space and leaving your lawn suffocated. However, there are things you can do to minimise the damage. Kate Turner, horticulturist for Evergreen Garden Care, who has worked behind the scenes on BBC Gardeners' World, Love Your Garden and Garden Rescue has some tips. 'The biggest obstacles are kids with trampolines and paddling pools. All the toys come out and they stay on the lawn. You might go on to websites which say 'Move your trampoline every day' but that's just not realistic. 'So we have to accept that during the summer just enjoy your lawn, don't get too upset about it.' However, there are things you can do to minimise the damage, she suggests. 1. Be waterwise 'If there isn't a hosepipe ban and you want to water the lawn, give it a deep soak one evening a week, or early morning if you're an early riser,' she advises. 'But the lawn is the most hard-wearing plant in your garden. So even if the dry weather continues, once the autumn rain comes, usually the lawn will bounce back.' 2. Let your grass grow longer Over the summer, don't mow your grass as frequently and if it goes brown stop mowing it completely, she advises. 'If you're not mowing the lawn, get the edges done because that makes the garden look so much smarter,' she suggests. 3. Sink your trampoline 'If you have young kids and you are going to have that trampoline for a few years, think about getting a sunken trampoline, because it's much safer,' she suggests. 'Dig a hole and line it with a weed membrane. You can get specialist companies that do it.' Once the hole has been dug, overseed the perimeter with a really hard-wearing shade-tolerant lawn seed, she advises. 'Now is a really good time to do it because the soil is warm. Rake over the area a bit, then throw some good hard-wearing drought-tolerant and shade-tolerant seed. You have to be prepared to water for the first few weeks.' Obviously you're not going to be able to move the trampoline once it is in, but at least when the children leave home you have a ready-made space for a wildlife pond, she adds. 4. Put up with the paddling pool 'There's not a lot you can do until after (summer), but get a ground sheet down first and put the pool on top of that,' she advises. 'If there's any stones or pebbles underneath the soil level it will stop it puncturing.' You could also make a feature of it, creating a path that leads to the paddling pool, which can reduce the mess around it, she adds. Once the season is over, use the pool water to water your lawn. Rake the area a little and then overseed some more to refresh the grass. If you have enough space and a small-enough paddling pool, move it once a week to give each area of lawn a break, she suggests. 5. Guard against football damage If you have a family of keen budding footballers, overseed the goal area now with hard-wearing seed – and you will need to water it until it starts to germinate – to help minimise damage later on in the summer, she advises. 'If you're not going to overseed because you already have a decent lawn, give it a slow-release feed to toughen it up.' However, like Wimbledon courts at the end of the tennis tournament, if that goal is in constant use over the summer you'll have to accept that it may be trashed during those months. 6. Feed regularly 'You can give the lawn a really good feed every six weeks and once we are into the summer proper, use something like a fast-acting green, which you can attach to your hose, spray it on and it greens the grass up and makes it stronger really quickly.' If there's a drought, don't use feeding granules, she advises, but go for a liquid feed because granules will need a lot more watering to dissolve and do the work. 7. Make a path Well-worn areas can soon appear on your lawn if you don't have a path, so create a simple pathway using, for instance, log edging and bark chip, she suggests. 'If you have kids, you could do a hopscotch effect with different pavers and put some plants in between them such as low-growing thyme and chamomile. Something temporary for the summer is a really good idea.' 8. Reduce pet damage 'Female dogs' wee is really acidic and what you'll find is that you'll get lots of little bare patches throughout your garden. 'Break it up with a fork and then add some special dog spot repair which incorporates seed, feed and calcium that neutralises the acid in the urine. 'It's either that, or when you see your dog peeing, you get a watering can and water it away straight away.' 9. Put toys away 'Always put the toys away every evening because just leaving that plastic tractor out will damage the lawn.' 10. Don't worry about the moss 'If you have a shady lawn that's full of moss, don't worry about it for the summer. It will be quite hard-wearing.'
Daily Mirror
a day ago
- Daily Mirror
Countryfile's Adam Henson opens up on 'very challenging' and 'horrible' struggle
Countryfile presenter Adam Henson, who has been fronting the BBC show since 2001, has opened up about a 'very challenging' year for the farming and tourism sectors Countryfile's Adam Henson has described 2024 as a "very challenging" year for the tourism and farming industries, primarily due to the extreme weather conditions. The past year recorded the sixth wettest spring in history, followed by an underwhelming summer that only saw a brief heatwave in August. In fact, the 2023-24 season witnessed the highest number of named storms since the naming system began a decade ago. The persistent rain carried on into September and autumn, wreaking havoc on the harvest, according to Adam. He said: "Yeah, it's been very challenging for, well, tourist enterprises, outdoor tourist enterprises and farms right across the UK, just because it's been horrible. "We've certainly got some fields with quite a lot of crops in them that we haven't actually harvested and we never will." In a conversation with Minerva magazine, Adam mentioned that nowadays, over 60 per cent of farmers take on a second job as a safeguard against poor seasons. "Duncan, my business partner, over the last 30 years, continued developing the farm park, and then to grow and expand on the types of diversification we've got," he elaborated. At 59-year-old, Adam reflected on the wisdom he gained from his father Joe Henson, who hosted a TV programme called In The Country. He remembers his dad emphasising that adaptability is crucial for enduring tough times. Adam shared how witnessing his father's career flourish through television work and the popularity of the Farm Park taught him the importance of having diverse sources of income at the farm. Adam took a hands-on approach to the family venture in his teens. "I love the Farm Park – the camping and glamping element too as well as the farming. We have a beautiful spot here and I love to share that." But he warns that farming comes with its shares of highs and lows. "To be a farmer, I think you have to be incredibly committed. I grew up in Wiltshire and lots of my friends are farmers and they never knew whether they're going to have a good year," he said. Adam himself faced a dire situation when the Foot and Mouth crisis threatened his family farm's survival. Speaking to The Countrywoman's Guide, Adam described that period: "For us, Foot and Mouth was a really hard time. "We were tenants of the farm and we were heavily invested in Cotswold Farm Park, as we'd borrowed a lot of money, on top of our heavy overdraft, to push forward the business forward." The outbreak struck soon after he and his business associate Duncan had taken out loans to grow their enterprise. With over 2,000 cases recorded nationwide and upwards of six million sheep and cattle culled to prevent the contagion, the UK was reeling. According to Adam, the epidemic left his business hanging by a thread. "It was horrible, and we were in trouble," he admitted. "The farm closed, the bank was closing in on us, as was our landlord. "We sat around the kitchen table with our wives – all our assets were tied up in the farm, if we lost the business, we lost our houses and our livelihoods."
BBC News
a day ago
- BBC News
Canada wildfires smoke turns UK skies orange
The sun and sky had a much more eerie appearance to it on Saturday evening and Sunday was a sign that smoke from wildfires burning more than 4,000 miles (6,400km) away in central Canada had made it across the Atlantic to sit in the skies over the WeatherWatchers from all corners of the country were out capturing the spectacle. Why has the sky turned orange? The fluctuating layer of smoke in our atmosphere meant that the expected blue skies in the evening and morning have taken on more of a dirty orange or milky white hue. The sun has also appeared as a distinct orange disc, leading to captivating sunset and change in the appearance of the sun and sky is due to smoke particles in the atmosphere scattering the blue wavelengths of light more, allowing predominantly orange and red hues to reach our eyes. How did wildfires smoke reach the UK? The presence of wildfire smoke from North America over the UK, whilst not common, does occasionally happen during the summer plumes of smoke that rise from intense fires, that can burn for weeks on end, sometimes reach the upper atmosphere to be picked up by the jet stream - a zone of strong winds, close to the level at which planes fly. These winds then carry the smoke particles across the recent weeks numerous fires have raged across many Canadian provinces, especially Manitoba and Saskatchewan forcing mass evacuations and triggering health alerts across Canada and the United in the UK, the smoke plume is at too high an altitude to affect our air quality. Is more smoke forecast? Forecasts show another plume of wildfire smoke could arrive with a weather system on Monday, further enhancing sunrise and sunsets where the cloud breaks.A change in the weather patterns by midweek will stop any further smoke from arriving, but the development of southerly winds is likely to bring the possibility of lifted dust from the Sahara and more interesting skies
