Morning walk

-
Some of us are not yet up...







I've never seen this before - young ivy foliage blackened by the frost. My poor maincrop potatoes have all been blasted by the frost. I'm pretty certain none of them are actually dead, but it will set them back a bit.


Allied to the late frosts, it's also very dry.

I love this time of year, particularly the smell, which even I with my very limited sense of smell, notice. There's cow parsley everywhere. I was born in Bedfordshire, where we called cow parsley cow parsley, but in Northamptonshire, where I am now, it's kek. Short and to the point.







Comments

Unknown said…
In Norfolk we always called it cow parsley. My rabbit was very fond of it.

Are those your pigs ?
22 May 2010 at 20:25
Jane Badger said…
No, the pigs aren't mine! They live on one of the village farms. I'm very keen on the idea of pigs, but the start up costs are so huge I've given that idea a miss for a bit!
24 May 2010 at 11:50
Jodie Robson said…
Northumberland the first buds of may are just coming out, and no cow parsely yet, but we haven't had any frost recently.
24 May 2010 at 12:23
Jackie said…
I love your morning walk shots, and wish I was diligent in doing the same - I see much the same things, the cow parsley, the frost, the cracked dry ground - goats and cows rather than pigs - but aren't we just lucky and blessed to live in the English countryside?
Lets hear it for here.
30 May 2010 at 23:09
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Rollkur and the blue tongue

-
I've been meaning to write about this all week, but reading the exclusive in Horse and Hound about the controversy tipped me over the edge. For my non-horsy readers, rollkur is a training/warming up technique used by some dressage riders. It basically involves riding the horse with its jaw pulled in virtually to its chest, in order to increase suppleness. Patrik Kittel , a Swedish competitor in Odense was videoed riding his horse in this way. If you watch the video , you'll see the horse's tongue hanging out - blue. It takes a while before the rider notices this. When he does, he stops, puts the horse's tongue back in, and carries on. There are two things which bother me about this. Firstly, I am fully aware large sections of the dressage world, and some of its brighest stars, consider rollkur perfectly ok, but the FEI guidelines state this practice should only be for short periods, allowing the horse to rest. Patrick Kittel apparently rode the horse for two hou
Read more

Archibald, don't eat the bedclothes

-
Image
My friend Louise sent me this picture today. It's from a children's book with the rather wince-making title For The Wee Ones. I thought, when I read that (because I read the message before I looked at the picture) that the picture was going to be a typical winsome production from the school of artists who think (or who are paid to think) that the child is a thing sent from God and a blissful thing. They had obviously never met a child, and certainly not mine. I should have known Louise better. The artist responsible for Archibald, don't eat the bedclothes slipped this one past the editors. Just look at the poor, broken Mother Rabbit. She knows she has not the faintest chance of being listened to, and poor thing, she is stooped in the way of a mother to whom this is just the lastest in a long line of horror; with nothing good to come. And Archibald is obviously the spawn of the Devil. Just look at those eyes. He'll have the bed after he's finished the bedclothes
Read more

Dick Sparrow - 40 Horse Hitch, and Neil Dimmock's 46 Percherons

-
Image
Here's a clip of Dick Sparrow driving 40 horses. It's an amazing sight, particularly when the shot changes to show the team from the rear and you get the great incongruity of modern American corporate architecture as a background to the wagon and horses. I love the anticipation in the video: the sense of something amazing being just round the corner is palpable. Thanks to Christina Wilsdon for telling me about this world record 46 Percheron hitch (alas just stills) but you get the idea.
Read more