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Solway, where history and natural history meet

15/10/2021

Alavna Roman Fort, 1147 miles from Rome

Solway is rich in history and natural history, so there are choices. We might head for the shore and look across to Scotland or seek out fish traps, saltpans and mile fortlets on the line of Hadrian’s wall. Today the weather is perfect and there's the lure of the Solway moss and salt marsh with the call of lapwing and curlew and coastal vistas.
Solway signposts flag-up history. Yesterday, we visited the museum at Alavna Roman Fort, north of Maryport, 1147 miles from Rome. Although Spanish legionaries stationed here might have yearned to know how far they were from home.

The red deer rut, Patterdale

13/10/2021

Red deer stag

During the rut, the stags bellow so loudly you might think it's easy to see them. Different stags try to out-bellow each other and the sound echoes over the fellsides swathed is fine mist and their rich red hides blend into the vegetation. Groups of hinds are scattered over scree and in gullies, feeding and moving little. A stag positions himself up on a ridge and throws back his head and bellows to impress his hinds. Bands of sunlight rove over the fells and we wait for the sun to flood over the gullies we are watching, to illuminate stags and hinds.

Mist over the Lyth Valley and Morecambe Bay

10/10/2021

Looking west toward the fells, from Scout Scar

From Scout Scar escarpment I looked down upon flowing mist aglow with sunlight and hovering over floodwaters down in the Lyth Valley. To the west, I heard geese flying high, and calling from distant flooded pastures.
South toward Morecambe Bay, the Kent Estuary was illuminated under a pall of radiant mist. A dome of blue sky lingered over Scout Scar on a glorious morning.

October skies and floodwater in the Lyth Valley

8/10/2021

October sunrise with Kendal Castle left of image

October sunrise catches the pall of mist defining the River Kent as it flows through Kendal. A flock of jackdaw is shrill. Trees are still in full green but, if you know Kendal Castle, you can make out its shadowy outline amongst the trees. Autumn sunrise over the river is a favourite thing of mine. And it's ephemeral, constantly changing and all over in half an hour- sometimes the most beautiful moment of the day

Scout Scar in October sun

7/10/2021

Blue skies over the fells

A brighter outlook today. Heavy rains have cleaned windows, naturally, and blue skies are patterned with fine white cloud. Who would not feel light of heart on such a morning after days of unrelenting rain?
A debris of leafy branches tells of wind and rain. But rain fell on such parched ground that the limestone has soaked it away and there is neither mud nor puddles. Once I crest the Scout Scar ridge I know I'll see floodwaters down in the Lyth Valley, best seen on a fair day like this, after downpours. The morning is calm and sunny, growing warm enough to tempt a red admiral to flutter onto brambles. There are flocks of goldfinch and the call of the raven.

Morecambe Bay, and Leighton Moss with bearded tits

30/9/2021

Morecambe Bay from Jenny Brown's Point

The sun quickly burnt off early morning mist to give hours of wonderful light. Carpe diem, seize the day in a week of unsettled weather when the longed-for rain arrived.
High tide peaked at 6.00am so waders were far out, from Jenny Brown's Point. A flock of lapwing came down on rocks amidst the channels. Curlew called and an egret was close to shore. The changing light over Morecambe Bay was beautiful.

Scout Scar with spindle berries and sloes

22/9/2021

Dew on sloe

'Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness
Close bosom friend of the maturing sun'

Robins sing in the silence and stillness. Mist hugs the fells and the sun will break through and burn it off. This could be a moment for sloes in the foggy, foggy dew. I haven't long.
The green fruit on a spindle bush ripen to rose. If its leaves last they could be autumn gold when the pink fruit split to reveal orange seeds. Mellow fruitfulness comes fitfully. Coincidence of weather and season sometimes bring wondrous effects, if you look, if you choose the right moment, the right year.

Otter and Bearded Tit at Leighton Moss

17/9/2021

Bearded tit

‘Go now. Hurry. Bearded tits have come early and they’re showing at the Grisedale Hide. ‘
Bearded tit, or Bearded reedling as sound-recordist and naturalist Chris Watson suggests. The reed bed is their habitat. They make their nests of its reeds and purple flowers, feed on its seeds in winter. Birds are calling from the dense reeds, a call ‘ like the clink of a cash register.’ We watch as they fly across the mown space and into the reeds.

Autumn gentian, Felwort, Gentianella Amarella

30/8/2021

Autumn gentian with eyebright

‘Have you found a four-leaved clover?' he called.
‘ We have something rare. Come and see, if you’d like to.’
On a south-facing slope In the short turf at our feet the flowers of Autumn gentian amongst dark linear leaves. Not spectacular like Alpine gentian. but small and intricate and – being hard to find- the more precious. Felwort, a plant of the fells. Flowers seek pollinators so when light and temperature fall low, like today, their strategy is to close up petals to safeguard nectar and pollen until it's brighter and insects are out foraging. ‘Dull purple, blue, pink or whitish’ writes botanist Marjorie Blamey in her ‘Flora of Britain and Northern Europe.’

Scout Scar in late August

28/8/2021

Ripening blackberries, and heather

Goldfinch on sunlit thistles on Kendal Race Course are calling to each other, plucking out thistle-down in the search for seeds. A few swallows gather in the trees.
High pressure during the last week of August, still and hazy sunlit days. So warm the colour of sloes deepens each day, from green to blue- the bloom fresh on them.
There are pockets of heather, trailing strands of bramble leaves and ripening fruit. With bramble late to flower, then a heat-wave, flowering was over quickly so the crop is poor. Sloes are abundant although, down in the Lyth Valley a cold snap hit the damsons and there are none to be had.

Smardale, a heather fell

17/8/2021

Heather in bloom, Smardale Fell

‘ Smardale gives the best views in England. You have to come every week, to appreciate it.’ If only ---
Less than a fortnight since our last visit and the alchemy of season and weather brings change. Cloud is low with fleeting illumination of distant fells, the Howgills, High Dolphinsty and Wild Boar Fell. Starlings gather along wires. Hirundines feed low, skimming about us, the light too poor their flight too fast to be sure whether they’re swallows or house martins. The first flowers of Grass of Parnassus appear low on the skirts of Smardale Fell.

Smardale with kestrel chicks and Scotch argus

4/8/2021

Great Burnet, Sanguisorba Officinalis

Sunbeams illuminate flowers on the embankment. The white plume of a parachute seed-head is arrested in flight. Sunlight and overnight dew reveal strands of spider silk strung between the flowers of great burnet, its petals of deep crimson bright as blood, great burnet, Sanguisorba Officinalis. An evocative name. Along the embankment of the disused railway there are drifts of great burnet and field scabious and vistas of the packhorse bridge over Scandal Beck.

Scotch Argus and conservation at Smardale

3/8/2021

Scotch Argus on Knapweed

Who comes to Smardale and what do they seek?
On a Butterfly Conservation field-trip there are visitors from Haworth and South Wales, eager for their first sight of Scotch Argus. It is almost peak-flight time for the butterfly. A man from Richmond tells of kestrel breeding and he’s seen a kingfisher. A red squirrel is seen and there’s a nest of wild bees. It’s gratifying to share our day with our experts Peter and Chris, and with those eager to make discoveries.
The weather is perfect. On Tuesday 3rd August the day is warm and still with sunshine and cloud so Scotch Argus are in flight and they settle too. The next day is hotter and brighter so they’re rather more lively.

Sylvan with Silver Washed Fritillary, Brimstone and Comma

26/7/2021

Brimstone diaphanous in sunlight 26 July 2021

Sunlight beams down through cloud and illuminates a woodland glade and all the butterflies seeking nectar from flowers. Delicate feet are poised amongst florets of hemp agrimony and a proboscis curves down deep to sip nectar. Intent on feeding. the butterfly is vulnerable to predation. Diaphanous in sunlight, the brimstone resembles a leaf, in the shape of its wings and the delicate green of the female underwing. A cryptic colouring and shape enables the brimstone to blend into its surroundings.

Sylvan with Silver Washed Fritillary

24/7/2021

Silver Washed Fritillary on Hemp Agrimony

Mine is a sylvan quest through a heat-wave in July. Deep shadows of the woodland fringe are the habitat of the Silver Washed Fritillary. On butterfly watch, we linger over flowers until the Silver Washed Fritillary flies from the shadows on wings of bright gold. When temperatures soared I fell in love with sylvan fragrances, with cool shadow and sunlit glade, and a woodland flora on the spring-line where water mint grows,

Silver Washed Fritillary, in the picture

21/7/2021

Silver Washed Fritillary, at first glimpse

From the first, the morning was hot with scarcely a breath of air. The wood was calm and still. Only the call of a great-spotted woodpecker, the mew of a buzzard, the whine of hoverflies. Grasshoppers were silent, until the sun rose higher and sunlight flowed into shady glades. Then the grasshopper chorus began Tall grasses and flowers were drenched in refreshing dew that brushed our bare ankles and made cobwebs visible Here was a morning of sensuousness.

Witherslack Woods, Howe Ridding Wood and High Brown Fritillary

18/7/2021

Northern Brown Argus on Common Rock Rose

Peregrine were calling over Chapel Head Scar and a pair circled above the crags on Whitbarrow.
Our target species for this butterfly field-trip was the High Brown Fritillary as some had set out at dawn, travelling across the country in the hope of sightings We assembled by old farm buildings and the morning was already hot with a gauze of white cloud. Temperatures were set to reach 25 degrees centigrade. Butterflies would be animated, lively, more of a challenge. Our leader Chris had come prepared.

Quest for Silver Washed Fritillary: butterfly foray 4

17/7/2021

Red admiral on bramble

Perfect weather for butterflies, including Silver Washed Fritillary. Bright sun with a high of 27-28 degrees and, sometimes, a whisper of breeze stirs in the canopy.. Butterflies love it, how will we fare? A herd of cows shelters beneath the trees where we plan to park and we share their shade.
To the greenwood. Here is sunlight, dappled shade and banks of shadow. And all the mysteries of a mid-summer woodland to discover, out of the shadows come butterflies.

The Wild Places: Sizergh with Silver Washed Fritillary

12/7/2021

A fresh Small Skipper

Are there wild places in Britain, asks the poet Kathleen Jamie? Someone at sometime has been there before us, shaping landscape since the advent of farming in early Neolithic times. We yearn for wild, although it’s illusory.
My destination of the day is not named on the OS map. Our butterfly field-trip is timed for silver washed fritillary. Its peak flight-time is imminent and hemp agrimony, a favoured nectar plant, will soon be in bloom. The silver washed fritillary likes a sunny day. The forecast is for high humidity with an 84% chance of rain! So unpromising.

Lingmoor and Little Langdale: a nature diary

9/7/2021

Bog asphodel, Narthecium ossifragum, Lingmoor Fell

A calm and still day with haze over the fells. Bog asphodel is spectacular with drifts of starry yellow flowers beside water-tracks and in boggy cols. Bog pimpernel is elusive and we search to find it. The familiar track rising to LIngmoor is gone, overwhelmed with high summer bracken, the map out-dated. So we slog up through bracken, spiny thistle and thorny rose. When we emerge beside a water-track with bog pimpernel we feel we have earned the flowers.