downland
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Nature Notes
A Midsummer Night’s Trespass. Midsummer. And after a day of heavy showers, all is glistening. The long grass is a heathered haze of flowering Yorkshire fog. My boots and jeans are already soaked through and the grass pollen has made lichen-green smears across my knees. There is a certain euphoria felt, running out into a […]
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Nature Notes
A Divine Path and a Pear Tree. I have deadlines to meet but, coming home from a visit to a neighbour, the light on the hill falls in such a way that the path to the top is engraved like a divine inspiration. I cannot argue with it. I had gone in search of a […]
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Nature Notes
Polecat Alley On Midsummer Night, polecats are making merry in the field behind the house. They are hidden deep in the rape crop but there is no mistaking them: barks and growls rise to a hysterical yikkering, haunting whines and murderous wails. My daughter and three friends are sleeping in a tepee in the garden […]