I took the family to Keyhaven with the intention of fishing for spider crabs off the rocks of Hurst Spit, but this plan was foiled by high winds - whipping up the solent into big swells and breakers - crabbing was definitely not on the cards.

Determined not to return home empty-handed, we went for a walk around Keyhaven harbour and out beside the salt marsh toward Lymington. There, we found Marsh Samphire in great abundance.

I've heard so many people speak positively of stinging nettles as a food, but for some reason that I cannot properly explain, I remained very wary of the idea - imagining they'd be very nasty and just waving away all the positive reports as wishful thinking or something.

But eventually, curiosity got the better of me and I decided to give them a try.

I went out looking for morels, but found none. My trip wasn't entirely fruitless though, as I happened across a small patch of St george's Mushrooms.

April 04 2008 - A lovely spring day, so I went out for a walk on the beach behind my workplace. I found some excellent Sea Beet.