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 Female linnet 8 April Nothing is as usual on Scout Scar. Not really. LInnet are returned to breed in thickets of gorse and I found this female above a blaze of yellow. Beautiful and constantly changing cloud-patterns this morning. And larksong. Skylarksong is my salvation. I look up into the clouds hoping to catch a glimpse, sometimes yes, sometimes no. And listening, listening, trying to pinpoint the sound.
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 Pussy Willow for Palm Sunday There's a haze of green as leaf buds unfurl. On the evening of Palm Sunday Her Majesty The Queen addresses the nation at a time of crisis. She reminds us of who we are, who we aspire to be.
Next morning, the songsters of the dawn chorus sing joyfully. On 6thr April the dawn chorus coincides with The Shipping Forecast and I'm spoilt for choice. The blackbird suddenly morphs into Arctic Tern and Tweet of the Day. Drink in small joys around you, says Katya Adler, the BBC Europe editor.  Male skylark on a bright day on Cunswick Fell Headline of the morning: ‘I’ve got castrations stacking up. Nine colts.’ It’s emergencies only for an equine vet. The colts must wait.
A paramedic with North West Ambulance Service is having a moment of respite from Covid 19 emergencies. He planned to write ‘Thank You’ on the grey bin we put out for recycling. I had leaned out of a high window and yelled my thanks to the sole refuse collector and driver of the van. Usually, there’s driver and a team of four. Next time, a round of applause for paramedics too.  Erratic with pistaciio-coloured lichens I wandered, erratic on Scout Scar. There was no route. A cloud, mizzly day . The inspiration was a sharing of our stories with two young women I met. 'You feel better for being here, even when it's raining.' We agreed. There were few folk abroad today, so we felt ourselves to be hardy. The dedicated We tell more about ourselves in these bizarre times, how we are faring. We wish each other well. ' Seen two red kites this morning,' a woman tells me. More of us are looking about us, listening to bridsong. Skylark singing .
 Male stonechat 31 March 31 March, began bright and with never a cloud. By miday overcast. A sontechat in display flgight , brilliantly lit. A make skylark, crest ererct. And he took off and began to sing. Zig zag choreographic moves down the Bristeer Road as we all avoid each other, merrily, social distancing  Wind-shear at altitude From the photographs, you would not know. . You cannot hear the silence, fewer aircraft, less traffic. If your local patch is like mine, if you can walk from home to reach it, you might notice something different. It’s unusual to see families on Scout Scar. I hope this continues once Corvid 19 is beaten. That parents bring their children to engage with the natural world, to look and listen.  Coltsfoot inviting pollination As photographers, we all have different interests. Back in 2014 I began to think macro for flower photographs. Down on your knees, in close and what you see is quite unlike a walker's view. These are the reproductive parts of a flower of interest to pollinators.
Each day I watched the swelling coltsfoot buds until the sun shone strongly, the buds burst open, and the sun's warmth triggered a release of pollen for bees. At night, the flower closed-up again, but once the petals had unfurled they didn't go back quite so neatly.  Erratic and its debris, Scout Scar Erratics on Scout Scar are striking natural sculptures. Boulders transported on glaciers during the last ice-age, then dumped as the ice melted. The bedrock on Scout Scar is limestone, the erratics are Borrowdale Volcanics, an older rock sitting on a younger. The inverse of what you'd expect.
Rock ground smooth, rounded, eroded as it is borne by the glacier. Sitting in a shallow basin on an alien bedorck.  Scots pine and pattern of anthills, Helsington Barrows A skylark calls amongst the crags on Kendal Race Course, a skylark lit by the sun, his crest erect. Another sings in display flight. Pattern of bright white cumulus clouds across the sky, and visible wind-sheer. Not a con-trail in sight , the skies silent. A preternatural peace. This is how the world was, this tranquillity.  Long-tailed tit. January 2020 Foulshaw Moss In Coronavirus self-isolation I look for inspiration, and seek to share what I find. It's spring. Open your bedroom windows, snuggle under the duvet and listen to the dawn chorus. After dawn, see what birds are visiting your garden. Make a habit of it and you'll discover nesting birds. Ours has a long-tailed tit visiting a feeder with fat balls daily. So there's a nest close-by.
 Lobed and veined Jew's ear fungus on an elder by the Eric Morecambe hide. Eric with arm raised, heel kicked up in classic pose. Other than Eric we have the sea-hides to ourselves. The car park is closed but we walked here and assume this does not apply to pedestrians In Allan hide it sounded like a railway junction, wind louder than the Carnforth train which ran behind the embankment. A run -away lawn-mower rattled in the roof. Last time, we had to manoeuvre the JCBs mending the pot-holes, refurbishing the track. The beck to the salt marsh is brim-full. Our boots are just clear of puddles. At 12.15 high tide could bring 10 feet of water to the car-park.
 Queen imprisoned in stained-glass, Bristol Cathedral 12th February 2014.
‘All sorts of weather and none of it good. A dangerous day,’ warns forecaster Dianne Oxberry- who died young. A Shipping Forecast packed tight with gales, hurricane force 12 off the Irish coast. Travelling south to Stratford-on-Avon, the sky darkens, the wind picks up with volleys of hail. The River Avon is yellow-brown and in spate, brim-full but within its banks, its direction bewildering. The wind blows against the flow of the river, intent on forcing it back upstream. The swans are embattled. Squalls lash at us as we head for 'The Swan' to see Hilary Mantel’s ‘Wolf Hall’ and ‘ Bring up the Bodies.’ The theatre door is open and the wind blasts right through the entrance and into the shop.  London, May 1536
The execution of Anne Boleyn: take 2 He witnesses the execution. He, Cromwell, the instrument of her downfall. He serves the king and Henry VIII wills it. Get rid of her. Bring up the Bodies- bring them forth for execution, it’s a concluding scene. He cannot walk away. It is a haunting, an execution. All those executions, He has been here before. A world-weariness possesses him.  Alpine at Sizergh Alpines flower at Sizergh gardens, crystals of ice linger on foliage. Squalls of hail overnight and we drive home in another pelting. Fragrant winter-flowering shrubs and spring flowers: wild daffodils and cultivars, crocus, hellebore, daphne and winter jasmine.. A rehearsal of spring, and we know this garden but each time it is particular to the season, to the day..
No day is ever the same and nor are we. Contemplating daffodils does not bring oblivion. Beyond Sizergh gardens there are dark clouds gathering. Who are we, the English, the British? Can we summon the national myth a time of crisis?  The Howgills, looking east from Scout Scar Fresh snowfall on the Howgills and cloud hugs the fells. Mountains make their own weather.
Up on Scout Scar there's a panoramic view. We are encircled by sunlit, snow-clad fells. The Howgills are distinctive fells, rounded and grassy- smooth and voluptuous under snow. Stone walls show dark and gullies gleam, packed dense with snow. To the north and west, the Lake District fells have a different geology, a different configuration..  Sunlit crag and the hanging wood below Scout Scar escarpment A crag on the limestone cliff of Scout Scar escarpment illuminates against an indigo sky. I watch the sun striving to break free of clouds, see the amethyst of birch trees in the hanging wood, see a white-washed farmhouse glimmer ghostly out of the darkness. The fells are hidden under dark skies and storm-clouds gathering in the north.
Quickly to The Mushroom Shelter before another pelting squall of hail. When it;s over the sun comes out and we step forth to see the fells gleaming under snow- the grand reveal.  Hail-bearing cloud sweeps south to Morecambe Bay The elements at play on Scout Scar. Flood-waters in the Lyth Valley tell of days and days of incessant rain. Hail-bearing cloud sweeps south from the Mushroom Shelter toward Morecambe Bay. blotting out blue sky. Hail stones melt on my camera lens. Sunlight from the south-west refracts fragments of ice in bursts of rainbow colour.  River Kent, looking downstream from MIller Bridge. 20 February Wind and rain relentless today. Yesterday afternoon there was some respite. From the Parish Church, the river flowed fast and silent, an olive brown. No water-birds at all. They must take shelter in vegetation and in eddies upstream. Nothing could swim in this turbulent river.
Stramongate Weir is always dramatic when the river rises. You can hear rocks in the river bed smashing together in the force of the water.  Male teal in breeding plumage 'Is this your first visit to Leighton Moss?’ he asked.
I remember a winter sun burnishing the reed beds, ice and biting cold. We were staying in a guest house on the front at Morecambe Bay. ‘Why come to Morecambe?’ a local asked, bemused. The sea froze that winter, chunks of ice clunked on the shore-line. A peregrine killed. Our leader followed its flight and we drove along the front, stopped to watch the raptor pluck its prey. Bristol Ornithological Club in the North West. February 1986 I think it was.  Looking north from Scout Scar escarpment Snow on the horizon, on the distant fells. And flood-waters in the Lyth Valley to the south. The wind howls and it's bitterly cold with squalls of hail-stones. Light and darkness sweep over the landscape so rapidly the photograph you glimpsed is gone before you click the shutter button with a wind-chilled finger. Ash trees confer, radiant against an indigo sky. The light fades and the moment is lost. The drama of weather makes the day.
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AuthorJan Wiltshire is a nature writer living in Cumbria. She also explores islands and coast and the wildlife experience. (See Home and My Books.) Archives
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