Wild @ Rivers - November 2017
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Diary Entry by Charmaine Cooper
Orchard |
A quiet month of dark grey skies and cold bitter winds rattling through the Beech hedge rustling the last remaining copper coloured leaves on the trees. Scattered below the hedge lie the leaves that crackle when walked through, reminiscent of childhood walks. The wind whips up the leaves and they eddy round until gently falling back to the earth. Wandering into the nursery scrub where the shadows are darker a shadowy black silhouette of a Fox passes quietly under the bare Hawthorn trees. The Fox may pass stealthily through the scrub but his passing has not been missed by the Magpies that explode into a cacophony of cackles and hound him on his way.
Blackbird |
The orchard is bare, the trees have lost their leaves and all the fruit lies discarded on the cold grass beneath the trees. But it is not wasted; the Redwings and Blackbirds are enjoying the feast of fallen apples. The orchard smells of fermenting apples and damp earth and of the rank odour of another visiting Fox. There is life beginning to bud on the Cherry trees’ branches; small dark brown nobly buds are visible at the very tips and the Hazel trees are producing immature catkins that hang stiffly on their bare branches. The orchard is slumbering awaiting the warmer days of spring.
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