Wildlife
The Shape of the Dawn Chorus
Tomorrow I’m getting up early, really early. Before dawn in fact, as it is International Dawn Chorus Day – a worldwide celebration of nature’s early morning music. The dawn chorus occurs when songbirds sing at the start of a new day. It tends to be most noticeable in spring, when the birds […]
North Yorkshire Turtle Dove Project
The beautiful Turtle Dove is our smallest European dove. This tiny power house of a bird flies 7000 miles to reach North Yorkshire from Mali in Africa each spring. Unfortunately Turtle Doves are in big trouble; their population has declined in both the UK and Europe to such an extent there may now […]
Fog and Fox
Still blanketed in fog here, as earlier in the week – but today feels so different. I’ve shut out the damp, cloudy feeling and I’m getting close and personal with a fox. I’m thinking of Jim Crumley and his book Encounters in the Wild – Fox as he writes so exceptionally about meeting […]
In the Workshop today – a Stare of Owls
The collective name most often used for owls is a Parliament – but I discovered there are many others, less well known, like Stare, what about Hooting, or Looming. They seem to make more sense to me. A Stooping, or Diss are suitably descriptive as well, or there’s a Wisdom of Owls. Anyway I’m […]
The Season of the Growing Sun
Of all the many theories surrounding the origins of Easter I like the Norse eostur, eastur, or ostara which meant ‘the season of the growing sun’, or ‘the season of new birth’. Our word East comes from the same source. Easter is the changing of the season. On that basis it is feeling very […]
In the workshop today – a Kingfisher
Carving a Kingfisher – Kingfisher in mind – azure and rufous, fast low flying over the water with short, sharp whistle sound. Flashes of electric blue. I’m working on a series of wildlife images carved within a circular border, in a similar way to my mouse and owl. This is the start of the […]
Bird Sculpture Book
In fact it is a monograph on sculptor Geoffrey Dashwood which I’m reading at the moment. It is a magnificent and illuminating book. The sculptor himself has written sections which for me, makes it doubly inspiring. It is a book of brilliance and filled with exceptional sculpture, it heaps such a surge of beauty […]
A newt in the goose pond
The snow melt-water gushes in torrents down the little beck here, bringing with it storm debris and silt, overwhelming and bursting the banks. Floating on the surface of the goose pond I found a newt, not moving, which I picked up and it sat lifeless in my hand. Its little body was like ice, […]
Snowy stoat
Many layered this morning as the forecast was for really cold, glad too, as it was blizzarding at the workshop, and into the workshop! Snow gets in through the smallest gaps and holes, and seems to go round corners to find its way in and I can’t clear surfaces quickly enough. The downfalls are, […]
In the workshop today – sketching in stone
I pinched a bit of time from myself this morning, it wasn’t planned, but sometimes it is good to take a little detour. I sort of allowed myself as I made an early start – the lighter mornings help, especially this morning as the sun is shining. In the fields to the north […]