A STRIPE OF LIGHT

I mentioned yesterday that I hate this change of clocks twice a year, much as I can appreciate the extra daylight it gives us. It isn't really extra light anyway, just the way we have to adjust and the person to blame is a builder, a certain William Willet, who wanted more working hours and so in 1907 proposed the idea in a pamphlet entitled "Waste of Daylight Hours." He died just a mere year before the Government enforced "British Summertime." in 1916. So ... almost one hundred years later, here we are coping ... just.

Now ... chooks adapt their body clocks to light changes, so by the time I managed to get up there to let them out, I think they felt a little bit cheated and were eager to free range.

They were not in a suitable photographic mood for me and my camera, so no photo's.

The weather this morning was to say the least, not great, rain overnight and misty.

I don't know where all the cattle and sheep that normally graze in this field were hiding,

probably in the shelter of the trees as a rather brisk breeze blew across the mountain.

Across the other side of the road, looking across an old (beautifully constructed) wall ...

there was a thin stripe of light beneath the rain laden, grey clouds above the sea.

In the foreground, the recently fallen autumnal leaves provided some lovely colour.

But notice the bareness of the trees in the middle ground, stripped by the wind of their leaves and ... in this case as they are hawthorn trees they are devoid of lovely red berries.

It seems that the beech trees are the only ones left with much foliage and that is falling at an alarming pace. Nearly all the other species are now, sadly almost totally leafless.

By the top mountain gate, the view was very much the same, but notice the vehicle tracks in the mud of the pens. Here is where many of the last sheep were gathered in off the commons and were sorted out as to which ewes and lambs belonged to who. It has been a busy time of year for our farmers as they choose which ewes will go with which rams and then basically it is up to the tups to do their annual job of mating to produce next years lambs. Gestation period is an average  of 147 days, so, depending on mating time we can expect lambs in approximately 5 months time, so come March we may see the first lambs.

Meanwhile ... in-between we face all the bitter, harsh winter months and the struggles that our farmers have to face to feed their flocks. Meanwhile, the light will change so many times and scenes photographed from the same viewpoints as seen here will change time and time again. But it is one of the things that I just love about the area I live in, the constant changing of the seasons and the skies, all the differences in the natural growth in verges and hedgerows and as followers of my blog will know, all the details from small to large that can appear throughout the year ... whatever the weather of the day may be!