Cumbria Naturally
  • Home
  • Blog
  • My Books
    • Cumbrian Contrasts
    • A Lakeland Experience >
      • Introduction
      • Derwent
      • Langdale
      • Ullswater
      • Kentdale
    • About Scout Scar
    • Atlantic Odyssey
  • Other Writing
    • What Larks!
    • Further - Explore Shetland
    • Autumn Migration
    • Rydal and Nab Scar
    • Perspectives
    • The River Kent
    • Wings
  • Gallery
  • Contact

Red Deer Rut, Martindale, October 2017

22/10/2017

0 Comments

 
Picture
Cloud sits low on Rampgsill Head and the roaring of stags echoes about  Martindale.  Mid-October and  the season of the red deer rut, an ancient, atavistic sound-scape.  The Martindale herd of native red deer is the oldest in England.   Through the loud wind the stags bellow their challenge for control of the hinds.  From Hartsop,  up  past Gray Crag,  listening and searching the gullies above Hayeswater, below The Knott,  toward Rest Dodd and the head of Rampsgill, below Place Fell we hear the bellowing of the stags.  It’s a rite of autumn,  the deer rut experience.


An atavistic experience, recorded with digital camera and a video with roaring almost drowned out by the wind.  At Hartsop, information boards tell of  the Hayeswater Hydropower Scheme.   Water is abstracted at the intake and  ‘ travels ( by gravity) down a buried pipe to the turbine at the powerhouse.’  Beside Hayeswater Gill we contemplate the engineering, the powerhouse and new grating,  drainage channels  and pipe  along the track.  There’s orange peel fungus in the gravels- a habitat it favours.  Orange peel fungus,  Aleuria aurantia.   A peregrine calls from the heights.    Raven, peregrine and the roaring of red deer.

Hinds are slender, their subtle colours through soft greys to chestnut, perfect camouflage for the fell-side.   The stag is built for combat: a thick neck to absorb the impact of the charge,  antlers that grow larger,  more tines come with age.  Today, the stags bellow and roar but  don’t engage in combat.
Beyond Angle Tarn, there is  marsh forklet- a moss that favours the edges of streams.   Odd that I couldn't recall the name but I could visualise the precise location where water-tracks trickle over the path at the foot of a slope.  And there it was. Marsh forklet,  Dichodontium  palustre.


After supper that evening, Barbara, Austin and I review our deer rut day over a tot of Jura single malt.  How I’d love to be on Jura when the geese arrive and the red deer rut is on- all 5,000 of them, imagine it!  Those highly manicured greens of the exclusive Ardfin Estate golf course would make fine rutting greens.   I think upon Loch Tarbert,  where in medieval times the deer would be driven north from Ardfin and trapped by hunters with bows and arrows  at the narrow isthmus.
.
0 Comments

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    Picture

    Author

    Jan Wiltshire is a nature writer living in Cumbria. She also explores islands and coast and the wildlife experience. (See Home and My Books.)

    Archives

    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    January 2015
    November 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    September 2012
    July 2012
    June 2012
    November 2010
    August 2010
    July 2010
    April 2010
    January 2010
    November 2009
    January 2009
    January 2004

    Categories

    All
    A Local Patch
    Birdlife
    Butterflies And Moths
    Flowers
    Locations
    Views
    Walks
    Weather
    WIldlife

    RSS Feed

Website
Home
Blog
Gallery
Contact



​Cookie Policy
My Books
  • Intro - My books
  • ​Cumbrian Contrasts
  • A Lakeland Experience
  • About Scout Scar
  • Atlantic Odyssey
    ​
Other Writing
  • Intro - Other Writing
  • What Larks!
  • Further - Explore Shetland
  • Autumn Migration
  • Rydal and Nab Scar
  • Perspectives
  • The River Kent
  • Wings
Jan Wiltshire - Cumbria Naturally
© Jan Wiltshire 2019 All rights reserved
Website by Treble3