WINTER LIGHT AND COLOURS

December 18, 2024December 18, 2024 | gaiainaction

Travelling through the Caha mountains during winter I find that there is plenty of interest to see and get excited about even just along the way. While some of my drives are taken in bad weather conditions, heavy mist, rain and or wind, most of the time I’ve experienced dry and also regularly sunny weather.

Most of all, this winter I find the skies fascinating. The colours, subtle, in pastel pink, light blue, ashen grey or radiant white, and even as if with a magic brush, diffused streaks of periwinkle purple. I’ve seen it all in skies over the Bantry Bay, over the Caha mountains and over the Glengarriff valeys. Ever changing skies with light of a beautiful quality. It certainly holds the attention of the traveller. These days I drive home when the sun is setting, adding another marvel of light, the setting sun, often spectacular!

Looking down into the valley there is a whole palette of different browns, beiges and forest greens. A true feast for the eyes. As can be seen in the photo below Glengarriff National Forest has a lot of birch trees growing, and apart from their stark white trunks, their branches are particularly beautiful at the moment. Every time I pass clusters of them I try to think how to name their colour, a type of maroon, or a vintage wine, or does it look more like an English lavender, burgundy, gothic mulberry or umbral umber. It is hard to pinpoint exactly the colour of those branches, and it also depends how the light shines on them and how the rain brightens them.

A variety of other branches, among them the deep red of the dogwoods is always very nice in a landscape, and so is the drama of the bleached grasses, rushes and sedges covering whole stretches of hillsides with cream blonde colours or even rusty browns.

Darkness falls early these days, painting the landscape mainly in moss green, dark brown or black, though the mountains in the distance do give us some mauve. The landscape changes constantly, it is very noticeably when driving higher up, clouds throwing huge shadows over the valleys interspersed with stretches of sunlight. As I said there is a lot of interest even in winter on my journey. Probably much more to discover yet and that leaves me with a feeling of ever more excitement.

I came across two photos of winter foliage recently, these are paintings of the Danish painter Peder Mork Monsted, (1859-1941) from his ‘Winter’ series. I thought it shows the colouring of the birch trees beautifully and rather well. I think his work very nice. (Referenced from Gallery of Art) with thanks.

THOUGHTS OF SPARKLE

January 15, 2023December 10, 2024 | gaiainaction

While I am recovering from covid infection my thoughts were turned to things that normally do not catch my attention so much. Of course I’ve had much more time to think, although during the first week it seemed my head was empty of any real musings and the fever probably was the cause of that. At the end of the second week now and finally starting to become human again. It was my first time having covid and it truly felt like a monster virus.

And so while sitting at my kitchen table, seeing some of the last of my Christmas decorations lying there waiting to be put away for another year, I was thinking… what gives me intense pleasure from the bling that I’m seeing? I’m not normally a typical bling person and in our tree my favourite bauble is no bauble at all but a little handmade piece of lace in the shape of a candle. And yet when my eyes chance to glance over these sparkling baubles it sets off a sort of childlike pleasure… is it the childhood memory of sparkling sweet wrappers which we only seldom were able to feast upon, or is it something more basic, is the reminder of a frosty morning when a winter’s sun makes branches and leaves sparkle like diamonds… I think it might be the latter, the beauty of nature when the sun illuminates the frost covered plants is definitely one of my great winter’s joys.

During this past Christmas I was given three books as presents, three wonderful books which I’ve already started to enjoy. All are about nature, one about the heartbeat of trees, one about the land and soil, and one about a journey into silence. In this last book the author talks about the search for the perfect moment, when there is a confluence of time and place and serendipity, all conspiring together to render a perfect moment (his words), He’s talking about his times he spent in nature and his meeting with the wild, with animals, birds and anything else he finds unexpectedly in wild places. I’m very much enjoying this book.

A lovely selection of reads for the foreseeable future that’s for sure.

WINTER ACTIVITIES, PLEASURES AND PERSONAL GROWTH

February 8, 2021 | gaiainaction

Hard to believe that we are already getting close to the middle of February. Winter is giving way slowly to early spring, though today you would not think so. We are experiencing a bitterly cold wind from the East and lower temperatures than is normal for this part of the country, which usually has mild winters.

This beautiful landscape, colours natural and not edited. Taken on a very recent walk close by.

But while the cold spell lasts there is plenty of planning and creativity going on inside. I made a true to scale plan of the garden so as to have a good oversight of it (and for the fun of it too). And I tested the soil on all of the 12 raised beds and found that they are poor, some beds depleted even in Phosphorus, and Nitrogen, but did a little better on Potash. So now I know what to add and where. I’m also cutting out snippets from gardening magazines that apply to our garden in particular. I do have some good gardening books but I find this somehow more personalised as I only keep what applies to my experience here.

Primroses are all the go here in the shops and we are all buying them as they herald spring and hope.

And so this year I am getting on well with clearing our garden sheds and I am finding quite a bit of wildlife while doing so. This most perfect example of Peacock butterfly I accidently disturbed but I am happy to say that it went to sleep again a bit further into the shed, I guess that it realised it was too early to go flying about. ~ Be warned about the next photo as there is a spider in it!

So these are some other friends in the garden shed, a small tortoiseshell (Aglais urticae) also overwintering and being paid a visit by our residental Steatoda Grosso (cuboard spider). This is a slow enough moving spider and quite beautiful really. I don’t mind him and I know that I will come across him again and a few more of his family as I’ve seen them. I would not like to be bitten though, they are know not to be aggressive and I have noticed that. I obviously wear a good pair of gardening gloves while clearing the shed! I’ve also come across large house spiders (Parasteatoda tepidariorum) but they are harmless.

Here in the small market town of Skibbereen a spice and exotic vegetable shop has opened and it did not take me long to go and check out the vegetables with which I learnt to cook in both S.India and in Mauritius. The delicious meals made thereof and the pleasure of the memories got me to buy quite a selection and for a whole week those dishes were on the menu. Among them okra and bitter gourd would have been most know to me, also the chayote squash. Some of the vegetables did not make it into the cooking pan as I want to root them and I was lucky enough to see a shoot coming out of both the taro root and the chayote squash, this is an experiment. Once before I grew a large plant from a taro root but it died when I went travelling.

Taro shoot – hoping it will send out roots too

Some of the dinners I enjoyed I improvised and did not stick to traditional Indian or Mauritian cooking, but did I use spices!

And then there is the garden! Well we have had so much rain now for many weeks that the garden is saturated and I am hoping that this present wind will dry the things out a bit. The garden looks forlorn at the moment and I am not doing much in it until the weather turns. I have lots of spring bulbs coming on though and they are a pleasure to see. (in my home-made small greenhouses to protect from heavy rains). There are still quite some vegetables ready for use, the cut and come back Kale and the leeks among them.

Our daffodils stay in the soil all year round, they are doubles.

And to finish off a picture of how cosy it is inside while out there the icy wind rages, throwing lashes of hail and sleet against the window panes. The wood burner keeps us nice and warm.

I’m finding that although we are quite isolated here and especially so with the current lockdown, I am making very many interesting contacts online, being invited to interesting social media groups on culture and art and on growing in calmness, quietness and reflection. Some of these groups are in my mother tongue (Flemish) and I enjoy that very much. Making new friends and maintaining existing connections with old friends. I was also invited to become part of a meditation group. It all goes to make this lockdown time quite interesting and a place of growth for me.

I hope that all your activities and experiences are keeping you inspired too.

Much love to all.

THOUGH NATURE IS MEANT TO BE ASLEEP, I SEE MANY SIGNS OF LIFE

December 29, 2019December 30, 2019 | gaiainaction

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Our garden does not know whether it should be asleep or begin to wake up. On this peaceful and last Sunday of the year 2019 I took a little stroll to check on my vegetables and herbs. So far it has been a mild winter except for one morning when all was white with frost. We did have more than usual rain though, and one or two real destructive storms which blew over our bird feeder and destroyed it.

I found that the few bean plants which survived being served as someone’s dinner (the slugs), are doing rather well, the spinach and the kale are doing great too. Among the herbs the oregano, thyme, sage, and rosemary are all thriving. The rosemary is even flowering, but then it flowered all summer too, perhaps it is an everlasting flowering type 🙂

The Camelia that I planted out weeks ago has buds and seems happy where I put it. The Californian Lilac is also doing great and I cannot wait to smell its flowers, and to look upon the red Camelia flowers later when spring comes along. Bulbs are pushing through the still very wet soil. And the young Californian Poppy plant I found fresh and green, early flowering is expected. It is always nice to take stock of the garden around the start of a new year I think, and to start planning.

A tender young Lupin plant has pushed through some leaf covering. And the Rudbeckias that I have been carefully tending since last spring when I sowed them, are so far doing fine, I hope that they will become strong plants and I know that they will last for years as I used to grow them before.

But I wanted to look a little further than my own garden today and took a walk through the Boreen and further-a-field. Planning has been received and work has started on building 50 houses for a social housing scheme. This will mean that from next year onward we will be surrounded by houses, whereas up to now we still had so many fields. But I understand that housing is needed badly and that the plan for rural Ireland is to have satellite towns and not much housing in the countryside, this to give easy access to all utilities without too much need for new infrastructure. Anyway that seems to be the plan for the future and the future is now. While walking the Boreen I found beautifully fresh and healthy Yarrow plants, I also found that the Gorse was flowering, and that the sweet little plants of creeping Hypericum are still intact and have not been affected by the wet weather.

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There had been a certain quietness around the place here with some neighbours away over the Christmas period. The land was also quiet this afternoon apart from some starlings, a wagtail and a thrush that I saw along my walk. Year’s ending has that certain feeling about it in nature, a stillness that is a promise of new life and activity to come. I like it.

Along my walk and in the Boreen, Yarrow, Creeping Hypericum and flowering Gorse.

And so we enter the last days of this year. Tomorrow my grandchildren and their mum and dad are coming to open presents, that will be lovely. The rest of the week will also be spent with family visiting and so we will enter the new year surrounded by loved ones.

PART TWO OF A WINTER GARDEN IN CAMBRIDGESHIRE

March 6, 2016 | gaiainaction

So we had just walked through the arch and entered that part of the garden where nature does more or less its own thing, though on the right there is a productive kitchen garden, which put my own to shame when it comes to neatness. And on the left we walked across grass overshadowed by a variety of lovely trees, mostly native to the Uk, and some already fully in blossom. This is the wilder part of the garden, it is a very important area, thinking of the many bees, bumblebees and other insects which are near extinction, or have decreased in number in recent years, it is good to have an area where they can be undisturbed and feed to their hearts delight. Here is more shadow because of the trees, it is also the quieter part of the garden, where one could sit and read, or just watch nature’s magic happen.

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Then in the yet another part of the garden a lot of clearing had been done just recently, overgrowth of roses from a neighboring garden had been removed. In a garden this size there is always some work to do, and this is reflected in the beauty and the variety of the plants.

Here the borders, even though it was so early in the year show a lot of different colors and textures, as reflected in my next collage. A variety of different Hellebores is to be seen nearer the house.

Mahonia aquifolium

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Ferns, and also Euphorbias make a lovely display.

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The colorful leaves of the Epimedium versicolor are a great ground cover.

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A succulent creeping among the black foliage, the black thin leaves conjure up images of being at the beach looking at some type of seaweed.

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I see boxes for a variety of birds which I am sure they are happy to use, and the white bell-like flowers add a lovely touch, all these early flowers are so important for insects, it is where they get the first nectar of the season which will help them recover after the lean winter months. All of this has been thought of and planned for.

DSCF2244 — Winter scenting Sarcococca confusa sweet box

This is one more subject that I would like to highlight, it is called Sarcococca confusa or Sweet Box, its scent will delight anyone and perfume a whole area, and its black berries are very attractive too. I am glad that I got to learn about this plant, as one of my future plans is to bring more scent into my own garden.

I’ve really enjoyed my visit to this garden, there is more one could say about what grows there, I have not even touched on the herbs which grow close to the house. Of course as my visit was in winter, I am sure that there is a lot more to see in summer. I am already looking forward to my next visit. I get ideas from visiting other people’s gardens, some of which I will try and use in my own garden. I’m certainly very interested in creating colour for my garden in the winter, it would cheer us all up during those dull and misty days.

My thanks go to Ruth and Colin for their kind permission to use their garden in my blog writing.

WINTER TREES

January 31, 2016 | gaiainaction

With the very wet winter we are having here in West Cork, it is rather showing up some beauty all of it’s own, it is how the trees look fresh, bringing out the colours of the trunk and branches, stark against a sometimes grey sky but now and then against clouds and sunsets. We have five trees in the garden, and these photos I took either from behind the glass if heavy rain, or outside, each brings out different aspects in the photo. Some bring out a rather foggy mood, some are melancholic, but some others bring out a bright clarity, it reflects the way that the mind is affected by the dampness, and according to Chinese traditional medicine, the mind is affected by the spleen, and the spleen is in turn very much affected by dampness, cold dampness, and that is what we get here in winter. It follows then that during these winter months the mind might become a little foggy if not careful, CTM advises us to eat warm stews made from root vegetables, with plenty of ginger to counteract this dampness inside… but that is going away from the trees a bit.
I love trees, I might even be a tree hugger, always want to touch their bark and admire their beauty, and beside that there is nothing as nice as using wood in the kitchen or wherever, the feel of it so smooth after it has been sanded, the lines and colourful markings are very nice too. I have wood on the ceiling and wall in one of our rooms, it often gives me pleasure to take in the many knots and lines visible to the eye. The scent also of wood is so pleasing.
Right now our trees are blowing in the wind, it is quite stormy and has been all winter, but they seem able for it. The silver birch moves most of all, it’s high and thin but the branches are very flexible. The Hawthorn moves very little – that is why the birds like to hide among it’s branches. The oak and the pine sway as if to the sound of their own music, while the chestnut watches over it all, stiff and majestic, even despite it has lost some of it’s branches last summer after we cut some down as they were making the garden far too shady. My trees are very much alive to me, I sense their moods, they are powerful and nothing fazes them, but they do like me to touch them when walking around the garden.
The trees, they give me much pleasure, I feel they are a blessing in our garden, and I am very appreciative.

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NEW BEGINNINGS

January 14, 2016January 14, 2016 | gaiainaction

Though colder the last few days, we are experiencing some sharp frost and even snow not too far away, there are nevertheless signs of early, very early spring and new life.

I took a stroll through the garden today, underfoot the grass is still very wet, because of the very mild but wet winter so far the slugs have not hibernated in great numbers and have been eating my kale with a relish, meanwhile creating real pieces of lacy art.

I found some white fungi on logs that are lying around waiting for dryer weather and to be stored properly. Our little Korean Fir is back outside after the Christmas festivities, there are signs of new growth, fresh and delicate, a delight to the eye.

The sprouts, leeks and parsley are doing great in the garden, the rhubarb though, has disappeared, and as a result of all the damp and wetness there is moss to be discovered, beautiful bottle green moss, growing healthily and bountifully.

Normally during January I start to get a real early ‘spring’ feeling and it releases a lot of energy, the last few years this did not happen, however, this January I got the feeling back again, my energy is on the up, full of plans and excitement for the coming year, whether it is in the garden or in the house, the plans are being laid. I have always like this saying:

Early in the year, early in the week, early in the day…. that is how I like to get things done, it works for me. At the same time, life is not all about ‘doing’, it’s much about ‘being’.

I guess a balance in everything is the best.

GARDEN SURPRISES

December 2, 2015 | gaiainaction

It’s amazing what can be of interest or beauty in the garden even in December while all the tree branches are bare and stark against the winter sky. For a while I have been watching the barks of our five trees, and the knots one can see in them, I actually never knew the connection between a knot in the bark and a branch, and that a knot is a branch that got enclosed in the wood of the trunk during years of growth. I see these knots all the time in the wood panelling inside the house. Today I took note of them outside in the garden. My Hawthorn tree has many knots, the douglas fir, chestnut, oak and birch less so. While observing the fir tree bark I found a variety of colours, some quite red, the bark is also covered in white in certain areas, not sure if it is lichen, fungus, or even bird droppings, there are quite a few birds that like to use this tree, this morning a lot of twittering came from it, there was only one starling sitting on it’s branches though. On the fir I came across a tiny little snail, and on the hawthorn bark around the knot there was a slug to be seen, so I guess bark is quite important for wildlife. Once I was thinking that I would have to cut down the fir, but during last summer I observed so many of our garden birds using this tree, I decided to keep it despite having to sacrifice a little bit of vegetables due to less light, as birds are after all so precious, and some of them are declining, sad to say.

At this moment another big storm has been forecasted for Ireland, we have had more stormy days than quiet ones the last week or two, but today was a perfect day, wind still and 10C.

As Barbara Winkler once said:

“Every gardener knows that under the cloak of winter lies a miracle. . .
a seed waiting to sprout, a bulb opening to the light, a bud straining
to unfurl. And the anticipation nurtures our dream.”

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To observe, to be enchanted, and to enjoy the simple stuff in life, is truly a delight.

Winter