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Catkins are heralds of spring at Sizergh

21/1/2022

Willow beside a frozen lake, Sizergh

On a bright winter’s day at Helsington Church we are alone, and not alone. A woodpecker is drumming, nuthatch are vocal and a bullfinch calls softly.
Yesterday, a raven rode the thermals by Scout Scar escarpment, legs reaching-out for touch-down but the wind swept the bird up into the air.
This morning is so calm our feet crunch audibly through frozen grass. Frost sparkles in the grass and enhances the intricate veins of a winter leaf.

Death of Nuance: a radio 4 discussion

15/1/2022

For a writer, nuance is indispensable, it's fun and challenging. So I was interested to hear a BBC radio 4 programme: 'The Death of Nuance.' The first episode was entitled ‘ Losing my Nuance.’ Later that morning I wrote to the editor of the Radio Times Letters Page, as follows

Cumbrian pastoral: landscape through time

4/1/2022

Cunswick Fell and the snow-clad Howgills beyond

Our day was pastoral. Over Cunswick Fell, then we follow a network of footpaths and green lanes linking farmsteads: Hall Head Hall, Bank End, Cappelrigg, Bonfire Hall and Cunswick Hall. On a winter’s day of sunlight and shadows we see no one and it’s as if we have slipped back centuries. Bonfire Hall, an evocative name. Cumbrian farmsteads are often designated ‘hall’, perhaps suggesting the status that might attach to a yeoman farmer.
To think back in time we need old maps, before the coming of railways and roads.

The Lyth Valley and Morecambe Bay in a sea of mist

19/12/2021

Mist flowing south down the Lyth Valley and out into Morecambe Bay

A bright moon last night with clear skies so a hard frost lingered in shadows through Sunday. I wrapped up warm against the winter chill and shed garments up on Scout Scar to sit in the sun contemplating a sea of mist.
The quality of light was different, with a strong sun from early in the morning, Toward Morecambe Bay, Arnside Knott rose dark above dazzling white mist.

Temperature Inversion: mist in the Lyth Valley and out to sea

18/12/2021

Burnbarrow Scar (left) with White Scar, Whitbarrow emerging to the right

A golden dawn with sunlit mist over the River Kent. There was frost on vegetation. The moment I set out for Scout Scar the fog descended. Seeing mist lingering in valleys, I learnt from someone coming off Scout Scar that the Lyth Valley was filled with mist ' like a lake.' Sun will quickly burn off mist, so I hurried to the escarpment to find some of my neighbours standing in awe and looking out upon a sea of mist. 'You feel you could walk over it.' The mist hangs over frosty pastures down in the valley and rolls right out over the sea at Morecambe Bay.

From Starlit Skies and Pastoral to communications satellites and space debris

16/12/2021

Selenehelion on Scout Scar

‘ There were shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. Luke 2. 8
A celestial scene little changed through two thousand years. Shepherds beneath starlit skies at lambing time. The Star of Bethlehem might have been a comet or a supernova, cosmic and of natural beauty.
Looking up at the night sky in 2021, ‘we could soon see as many satellites as real stars. Disastrous for astronomers’. Says Professor Catherine Heymans, Scotland’s Astronomer Royal.
Disaster: counterfeit stars, space debris and communication satellites’

'Today' on Scout Scar

10/12/2021

Fresh snow on the fells to the north of Scout Scar

Fresh snow gleams on the distant fells. Such beauty should dispel the rubbish thoughts that dominate. Today, I could not shake off 'The Today Programme.' Where did the money come from to refurbish a Downing Street flat? Parties whilst the rest of us are in lock-down. Pets taking precedence over refugees in flights from Afghanistan. When the law doesn’t suit, ride over it rough-shod.
Is this the stuff of Government, in a pandemic?

Leighton Moss with pintail in December sunlight

2/12/2021

Reed beds and winter trees sunlit

What's special at Leighton Moss in December?
White frost glistens at our feet, sunlight illuminates the reed beds, like a winter flowering. We walk to the causeway hide beneath a sky of intense blue shading to icy pallor. All this and birds too.
The hide frames our gaze, our focus on the freshwater pool where Ice reaches from the reed beds, slowing the flow. The blue sky is mirrored in the pool until the gleam fades and we look up to see a breath-taking pattern of flowing cumulus, white on blue.

Sunrise and snow crystals falling on spiders' webs

28/11/2021

Fresh snow crystals caught in spider silk

A sunrise of ever-changing hue and pattern.
Each morning, as I watch the coming of dawn, I see flocks outlined against the soft colours of sunrise. Thousands of dark birds flying north, probably starling. This morning I glimpse them far off and when I edit the images I can faintly make out the flock spread out across the sky. They must roost to the south and fly north to feed once daylight comes.

Leighton Moss with snipe, pintail and shoveler

17/11/2021

Islet with roosting Shoveler, Pintail and Snipe

A marsh harrier flew low over the reed beds.
A water rail was squealing as we looked out across the fresh-water pool to an islet where water birds roosted. Shoveler of bold colours and long, broad bill. A cluster of Pintail, an elegant duck with long central tail feathers. Sheltering on the far side of the islet were some four or five snipe. Roosting with heads turned and bills tucked into the feathers of their mantles. These birds might seem somnolent but their eyes were watchful.

Spindle-trees: Helsington Barrows and Sizergh

13/11/2021

Spindle-tree, Euonymus europaea

The woods are rich and mellow. Sunlight discovers colours hidden away during November days of rain and murk. It is warm and bright as a summer’s day. Green catkins show on hazel, with silver birch shedding leaves of gold. Today, the feathery sunlit fruits of Clematis vitalba are Traveller’s Joy. Its other name of Old Man’s Beard is for less resplendent days
Berries mingle in the woodland fringe. Fleshy red yew arils peep from dark foliage, holly berries show against blue sky, with pink spindle fruits and arcing branches of hawthorn berries.

Sizergh and Helsington Barrows: autumn fruits

6/11/2021

Black bryony, Tamus communis

Once upon a time, I made a cornucopia at Halloween. The bright and bold allure of autumn fruits, a witchy mix nutritious and deadly. A naturalist's collection of beguiling beauty.
Today, on an atmospheric November morning when the fells are hidden and rain clouds lour, we gather sloes, linger by the orchard at Sizergh, and leave the poisonous fruits of the hedgerow to birds, mice and field voles who eat them without harm. A scaffold of black bryony weaves into the hedgerows, trailing twisted ropes of glossy red berries. Beautiful to look at, best left alone.

Sky light at Halloween

31/10/2021

Skylight: raincloud with winged birch seed

Out of the darkness before dawn comes a whistling wind, seeking slits in the window frame. Window, the eye of the wind. The haunting note drowns out the sounds of the rain.
Dawn is held back, reluctant. The skylight window pane is awash. The wind whips the tall birch, slaps leaves and winged seeds against the glass.
Clouds lour and, for a moment, lighten. The rain halts and blackbirds appear in the birch trees. Where were they in the wild time? The whistling wind is gone but the sky grows darker, presaging rain.

The River Kent in spate

30/10/2021

Blind Beck by Abbot Hall

All morning the rain fell unceasingly, after days and days of heavy rain. At mid-day the sun appeared and, knowing the RIver Kent must be brimful, I walked down into Kendal to see.
Blind Beck runs close by Abbot Hall, draining water off Scout Scar, off the limestone and down through the town to the river. After a prolonged period of rain there's an audible rush of water through stone channels between houses, down to the river, a magnet during a brief respite from the rain.

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.