hawfinches
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Nature Notes
The Blackthorn Winter & the Hawfinch. We are in the midst of a blackthorn winter. The sloe blossom on the low trees and hedges (that have not been flailed) is a frothy surf upon the damson-coloured thorns that pre-empts its leaves and often presages the lion’s roar and bite of March. I have been haunting […]
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Nature Notes
Mercurial, argent: winter chalkstream. Below the high chalk of the North Wessex Downs, rainwater that has percolated through the porous substrate, flows at a near-constant 10C into benign, gin-clear chalkstreams. For otters in winter, this is a good thing. And there is potentially a better chance of spotting these elusive, mercurial creatures now: with their […]