From the grave yard of a little chapel, built in 1673, that’s tucked away, between the forest and the hills; a beautiful place on a beautiful summer evening: pushing up daisies? to be dead, buried beneath the ground.
Chickens have a third eye lid a nictitating membrane it moves sideways across the eye, from the inner corner of the eye to the outer; here is one of the white leghorns taking a drink from the pond,
I’ve unintentionally pressed the shutter when the membrane was across her eye, she normally looks a bit brighter eyed than this; we humans have a vestige of the membrane still remaining in the inner corner of our eyes, isn’t evolution clever.
some birds fly with the membrane closed, it’s thought that it helps protect the eye from dust and grit, its transparent so they don’t crash, sort of Biggles goggles for birds
The lower eye lid of the chicken is more mobile than the upper, they ‘blink’ with the membrane, closing the eyelids ‘proper’ for sleeping, this is Thing One basking in the sun.
Birds have developed a flock of adaptations to suit their needs Woodpeckers tighten their nictitating membrane a millisecond prior to their beak impacting the trunk of a tree in order to prevent their eyes from leaving their sockets
I think that is so cool,Tom thinks it is ‘mint,’ as I imagine, does the woodpecker.
In more than one sense of the word. A walk to one of my favourite spots,
revealed some tree stumps all that remained of some handsome Scots pines.
it’s National Trust land (that’s leased for grazing) so I wouldn’t have expected to see such crude forestry management,
Walking deeper into the stand of trees, I found the reason. Someone’s idea of ‘al fresco’ dining on a summers evening.
Kid’s? well probably older than that, as I suspect they would have driven up there and parked in the layby, after all you wouldn’t want to walk far carrying an axe, booze and BBQ food, but who ever, it really hacks me off. I live in hope that next time they will get more than they were looking for
It was my birthday last week, I was given some beautiful scented lilies and a lens for the camera, I haven’t yet got to grips with the lens, the sensation is not unlike like swapping the family hatch back for a high performance sports car, I am not in quite in control, but I can ‘feel’ it’s potential. More test drives required.
I’m sorry I digress, ‘Uh Oh; it’s windy, duck is going for a walk.’ comes from the children’s book, ‘Duck is Dirty’ by Satoshi Kitamura and it was a favourite book with the boys when they were very small, I wonder just how many times I read it to them, I know it was a lot.
The words came to mind yesterday when I went for a walk, it was wild, gale force winds, brining down sizeable chunks of tree
and turning the leaves inside out, I made a hasty pass of a derelict farm building, the roof of corrugated iron looked ready to let fly at any moment
But whilst the wind was buffeting, it wasn’t unpleasant, up on the hill the wind was scented with the smell of bruised bracken and it was sunny and warm. In fact it was a ‘right good drying day’ if you could keep the washing on the line as there was a high risk of your laundry getting snatched off and turning up three fields away. Mr Uhdd did a sterling job of pegging the washing firmly to the line, so much so, the pegs stayed on the line and our duvet cover shredded like an old flag, ‘Perhaps you could mend it’ he suggested ‘But to mend thing’ I pointed out ‘you have to have something of substance to sew the repair too’ and this I am afraid is a no hoper. But then again, yesterday wasn’t windy; this is what proper wind can do
This evening at 8:30. Why is it always lighter on the ‘inside’ of the rainbow? the answer may be in here but I’ve yet to read it all; as this is a post it in the moment sort of post, you will have to work it out for yourselves.
One of my favourite painters, Joseph Wright of Derby, I have written about him before, must have been a bit quick with the brush, seeing as he didn’t have a digital camera in 1794
This little bird is a chick from one of two families of blue tits that have been nesting in holes in the barn wall, he sat on the edge most of yesterday, while the parents worked their socks off feeding him, Tom and I were beginning to wonder if he would get so fat he would be stuck for the duration, in the end he gave it a go and we found him on the grass, or maybe one of the other chicks gave him a push.
Come to the edge.
We might fall.
Come to the edge.
It’s too high!
COME TO THE EDGE!
And they came,
and he pushed,
and they flew. Christopher Logue
Well not quite we found him on the grass, twice, not much bigger than a butter ball, he looked very vulnerable and the cats looked very interested; we poked him back in the hole,(about 7ft off the ground) and left Moss the dog on sentry duty, keeping the cats at bay: there is not much more we can do, nature will have to take it’s course.
The other brood are about 16ft off the ground, so popping them back in the nest wont be so easy.
The seeds of next years ‘honesty’ (Lunaria annua), all neatly stored in a ‘blister pack’
Honesty flowers attract butterfly’s, I like its silvery seed pods (a favourite with flower arrangers) that will develop as the summer progress, I suppose that’s where it’s Latin name originates from, they look rather moon like; it grows on a pile of rocks at the bottom of the yard.
(Note to self, to try and get some established in the garden.)
Last nights ‘red at night shepherds delight’ sort of sunset worth waiting for, I walked up to the top of the ridge, visibility was so clear I could even make out the tower blocks of the town best referred to as the ‘hole in the ground town’ a town who’s only redeeming feature is a truly beautiful Victorian railway viaduct, other than that it is best viewed from a distance and bathed in a flattering light of a summer sunset.
As a bonus whilst taking this shot, I watched a badger (it was huge, the largest I have ever seen, dead or alive) trotting along a track and disappearing into the undergrowth. Now I know badgers are not popular with farmers in many areas, because of their part in the spread of TB in cattle, and in parts of the country their numbers are at an all time high;but around here you are more likely to see them as bloated ‘road kill’ than going about their business, so it was a treat.
Badger don’t seem very bright at crossing the road, unfortunately they are creatures of habit, using the same tracks and set’s year after year, they don’t seem to get the concept of ‘not crossing on a bend’ ( I know they were around long before the automobile, they have every right) A few months ago, I came across what at first I thought was a car accident, it was dark and on the road to ‘nowhere’ when I saw a car stopped in the middle of the road and what looked like a body in lying in the road and people crouched down next to the ‘body.’ Brandishing my girl guide first aid certificate, I offered my assistance, fortunately the body, turned out to be a badger (but not fortunately for the badger, obviously) the badger was in my humble opinion about 98% dead, the people with it were, I’m pleased to say 100% alive; I pointed out that to be on a bend on an unlit road on a dark winters night was not a good place to be, unless you wanted to end up like the badger, they said they couldn’t leave it, so I suggested they move it, at this point I could see it was all a bit of a lost cause, I took my leave and left them debating what to do; I don’t know how they got on, I hope the remaining 2% badger wasn’t the biting bit.
On the subject of road kill, whilst in the Lakes the other week I thought I had found the perfect addition to my skull collection when I found a fox skeleton complete with bushy tail, at the side of the road, poking at it with my boot I found that it still had its black nose (that skin must be a bit tougher than the rest) and that the skull was ere, um, how shall we say, a little too ‘active’ and smelly for me to get away with bringing it home in the car, shame, it had a fine set of teeth.
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