Photos from RG4

This site offers pictures taken from within the local RG4 area. That covers Cane End, Caversham, Caversham Park, Emmer Green, Gallowstree Common, Kidmore End, Mapledurham, Playhatch, Sonning, Sonning Common and Tokers Green. But it’s easy to step over boundaries into other postcodes. Forgive me if I stray.

The galleries are themed around topics. There are smaller sample photos for each gallery, and clicking on them will launch larger sized pictures.

‘RG4’ is an accompaniment to the ‘Caversham’ website, which you can find here:

The Galleries

The gallery of images, above, all taken around and about Foxhill Lane, is a good accompaniment to the ‘Tough Times’ item on the Caversham site.

Climate-change-created problems apply to farmers too. And, inevitably, poor crop yields will have knock-ons for everyone else. We all need food. The climate crisis is world-wide. The question for all of us should be what can we personally do by way of damage limitation. This is an emergency, whether we like it or not.

There is a BBC item looking at the drought issue here (July 2026):

There is a national response to this crisis with the National Emergency Briefing (N.E.B.). You can get involved – you don’t have to wait for the government. Details are here:

‘A New Future’, which lives under the Unstated umbrella, has a guardedly positive view of things:

And on the Unstated main site you can find a shorter overview of the situation we’re all in, and what we need to do to tackle it:

The bluebells this year (2026) seem to have have been particularly successful. The photos in this small gallery were all shot in the woods between Caversham and Stoke Row. I was pleased to read that others, too, think of them as more deep violet-blue in colour rather than a pure blue. Note that the native English ones are a deeper colour than the Spanish invaders. There’s more about them on the RHS site:

In line with the brief of this site, these are pictures taken of boats on The Thames in the RG4 area. However, in truth they could be moored at any number of places. Not to worry. Whatever and wherever you live, it’s always valuable to pause, notice and, indeed, appreciate what’s around you – however extraordinary or ordinary it is.

Yes, these are common enough garden birds, but that doesn’t make them any less colourful and enjoyable to see. These are all shots taken in a small Caversham garden, often through windows, often with a fairly extreme zoom. So the quality isn’t always that great, but I didn’t want to disturb these visitors if I could help it.

The link below takes you to an entry on ‘personal plumage’ on the Caversham site.

With the climate changing so unpredictably, how plants react to the conditions they now find themselves in is, for many, a challenge. And humans? It doesn’t require any great insight to realize we are similarly responsive. This gallery of early spring colour in a Caversham garden was prompted by – and is a reaction to – all the dull, wet weather we’ve been having in England. (I’m told that some experts are forecasting a UK that’s 37% wetter in coming years.)(See also ‘The Relief Of Spring’, below.)

As an appropriate accompaniment to the ‘A Natural Response’ gallery above, this set of photos of a chilly Caversham garden in early 2025 is a reminder that everything climate-related is a variable. Frosty days may be less frequent now but they will still occur. It’s easy to forget that variable weather can include the once commonplace. (See also the earlier frost-related images, ‘In A New Frame’, below.)

Autumn offers its own pleasurable sights. There are more thoughts about autumn on the Caversham site.

Fungi in Caversham, below a tree on the verge of an ordinary road. The link below takes you to the accompanying post on the Caversham site.

Common-enough colours to be found in an English garden – collected here, not least, as cures however temporary for dull-day autumn or winter doldrums. The link below takes you to the accompanying post on the Caversham site.

A small series of black and white photos. The plants were not unusual. The main point of interest lies in how different things look without all the normal cues we take from colour. The photos in ‘Dull-Day Doldrums’, above, are of the same garden.

It was looking again at the photos above showing recent building work in Reading as seen from Caversham that brought home to me how things are now.

If you look closely you can spot three spires – they could be jostling for position. Once upon a time in England, a church or cathedral was the biggest building in an area. Back then, size equated to significance. The church’s rule was near-total. Nowadays? I think it’s clear commerce now dominates more completely than ever before. (And the Christian belief in the impossibility of serving both God and Mammon seems largely forgotten. Start with Matthew 6:24 if you’re keen.) The consequences of our current business-led reality, along with any alternatives, are different issues altogether.

Walking by the new flats near the prison. The prison itself. I found myself wondering about hope. I can remember how pleased I was to get a place of my own for the first time. The freedom that came with owning a home, however small. The freedom that came with independence. But, of course, things change – what housing is available, the costs, the hopes, the expectations. And I found myself wondering whether the same freedom I felt, way back when, can still be experienced. And then I wondered if the way the whole world is changing means the big picture is now so different that all my nostalgia is irrelevant. Climate change means everything else needs to change. You can’t build on shifting sands.

(And yes, I now know, the flats and the prison are on RG4’s border in RG1. Hey ho.)

I’ve no love of most graffiti when it amounts to more-or-less writing a version of your name. Add in dull artwork and tedious repetition and there’s not a lot to like. But every now and then there’s an interesting message being conveyed, a communication that makes me smile or nod or pause and think. This is a gallery of some of the these strangers’ messages in the Caversham/Emmer Green area.

Spring blossom. This is a gallery of simple snapshots taken pretty well on a whim. They were all captured in Caversham, on the same day, within about an hour. None of which lessens the pleasure – and, indeed, relief – that comes with the arrival of spring. And that’s a sense of relief heightened by climate change. Nothing is guaranteed.

They say ‘the devil is in the detail’ but with these photos I was trying to find some easily-overlooked delights too. If you like, I was trying to see more than the big picture. The context for these photos is to be found here:

Appreciating how moisture in the air can bring out the delicate strength of spiders’ webs is all very well, but it does bring up some questions about art. There are a few thoughts on that side of things on the Caversham site here:

When there’s a frost things can take on quite a different appearance – they appear in a new frame, as it were. It’s good to pause and appreciate what’s to be seen locally.

A grey squirrel raiding a bird feeder. This was in Caversham but it’s a scene repeated up and down the country. Given that defeating grey squirrels seems pretty well impossible, all we can do instead is admire them.

The Caversham site entry on the location is here:

There’s more to a location than just the ‘big picture’. These are all photos of natural textures to be found in Caversham Court.

The Caversham site entry on the location is here:

There’s a real variety of people in Caversham. And that has to be a good thing. The story behind the photos is on the Caversham site:

Even something as familiar as an often visited ‘urban wood’ can hold plenty to see, if you look with the right eyes. These photos are all taken in Clayfield Copse over just a couple of visits.

Greens – there for anyone and everyone to see and appreciate. The background to these photos is on the Caversham site:

The pleasures of ripples on water. These photos are all of the RIver Thames. You’ll find related thoughts on the Caversham site:

There’s something quite wonderful about fungi. It’s well worth stopping to notice them, as they often don’t last for that long. You’ll find more information and links on the Caversham site:

I have been noticing the alleys in Caversham. Above, a selection that also include bars of one sort or another. For more on alleys, there’s this item on the Caversham site:

There aren’t that many (public) places in Caversham with broad views – but Balmore Park offers a fair variety of vantage points. The link (on the Caversham site) below will take you to more details and a map.