On 1st September, little is more likely to cause a social media pile-on than excitedly proclaiming ‘Yay! It’s the first day of autumn! Goodbye summer!!’ Cue legions of annoyed folk ranting and arguing about equinox, equilux, harvest moons and goodness knows what else. Weather bods like to compartmentalise the seasons into three-month batches. Meteorological autumn is therefore September, October and November, and 1st September is its first day. It’s nice and orderly, happens the same time every year, and given that the meteorological autumn offers me the earliest opportunity to put summer to bed and confidently embrace the prospect of…

If you’re fortunate to share your daily life with swallows, as many of us are, you mightn’t necessarily realise just now reassuring a presence they are. They bring constant movement to the air, constant twittering to the sky. They’re a familiar but subtle backdrop to the summer months. And then, just like that, they’re gone. And everything just feels a bit….empty. We’re not quite at that point yet, but with day length shortening, it’s not far off. Swallows and martins Just so we’re clear which bird we’re talking about here, swallows are the lightning-fast ones whizzing about the place with…

After a winter of relative dormancy while much of the natural world slumbers, our senses kick into high gear as the warmer months progress. The explosion of life and activity means there are many amazing sights, sounds and smells for us to take in. But while most species grab our attention via one or perhaps two of those senses, the scots pine manages to tantalise all three. The sight We all know what a splendid sight old scots pines are, with their scaly red bark and sprawling asymmetrical crowns, and we love them for it. Their gnarly, deep green beauty…