Blog
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Nature Notes
A Spring of Hares. April weather and the season is on. Celandines that had pinched petals in tight pursed pouts, open to shine, glossy and reflective, back at the sun. In a week, balled fist-buds in a landmark sycamore give up the fight against winter and relax, opening palms of crumpled, damp-handkerchief leaves that tremble […]
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Nature Notes
An Apparition: Starlings & the Peregrine. On a bright afternoon, we go birding in the Land Rover, not anticipating much. The last embers of redwing and fieldfare flocks glow – and babble like a stream through the trees. Near the dewpond, it becomes apparent there is a huge flock of birds, just over the ridge […]
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Nature Notes
The Dewpond on the Height. “Our blunt, bow-headed, whale-backed Downs, Bare slopes where chasing shadows skim … We have no waters to delight Our broad and brookless vales— Only the dewpond on the height Unfed, that never fails” — Rudyard Kipling Just off the beaten track of Wigmoreash Drove, not far from the beech hangar, […]
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Nature Notes
Winter’s Spring. The weather swings between seasons. Water fills ditches and rivers travel backwards; the River Lambourn’s source backs up to higher East Garston, where it is winterbourne. Another dusting of snow makes the hill blanch pale. At the snowline, a snipe goes up with a cry like tearing fabric. The wind bites, so I […]
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Nature Notes
Black Kites, Bicycles & other Local News … To celebrate our local newspaper’s 150th Anniversary, I show the students at school a short film from 1952 when Newbury (through its newspaper) was chosen to represent British life to the Commonwealth. It raised an interesting debate on the changing face of journalism, women journalists and the […]
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Nature Notes
Silver Downs and Anthills The night before it snowed, I took the moonlit road to the downs. The ribbon of tarmac gleamed like chalk and disappeared somewhere among the stars. At the top, the sheep lay like grey wethers – stones deposited by the last ice age; ancient beasts with the moon on their backs. […]
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Nature Notes
Love & Comets: A Brother’s Re-Leaving. My brother and his family came home for Christmas. And by home, I mean where our parents are. He lives in Australia. My nieces have not seen (nor the eldest remember) an English winter. We want snow for them or at least, a lasting, Narnian hoar frost; but instead, […]
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Nature Notes
Winter Gold. The ninety-acre field could be a bleak prospect. High and exposed, it can appear a vast expanse of tilled mud: six-inch high rape leaves, little else. Squally showers come on biting gusts, shaking the new leaves to silver with a loud pattering. The mud is heavy on our boots. It seems an incredible, […]
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Nature Notes
Hotchi Witchi. An Apology. Near-dark, and I am trying to point out a small, still hedgehog under a hedge by the Scout hut to my son. He only sees it when it trots off, a conker on fast little legs. He is astonished I spotted it. But I have a special eye for hedgehogs. And […]