Getting the picture

Now the site is up to date it is time to reflect on what is now there.

The Kerry Lily had always intrigued me - only lives in one part of Kerry and reportedly a really worthwhile member of a very beautiful family (the Liliaceae).

I realised we would be in the Ireland at about the right time this year and, what is more, on the way to the Burren, making the location a minor detour.

So we found our way to the end of Lamb's Head (tricky when the road seems to take you other ways - the routes to houses along the way being more used) and I climbed up onto the headland.

Not much sign of the Lily at first. Then I spotted a flowering spike - no flowers open. Soon found that the plants were everywhere around me (about 30m up) but not much sign of the actual flower yet. Too early ?

Eventually after several passes along the linear rock formations I saw a flower and spent the next few minutes photographing it.

No more flowers were apparent on the head so we set off for Derrynane nearby where more were found. But even if the solitary flower on Lamb's Head had been the sum total it would have been worth it.

Seven days later we heard that the Ring of Kerry roadworks nearby had been stopped because the flower had been found near to the road.