That is us past the Spring Equinox, the clocks change twenty sixth, so let us hope Summer is around the corner, it has been a loooong Winter with a Spring of sorts. So good that daylight is now longer than darkness as it will save on putting lights on in the home and can start some good evening fishing.
23rd.
This fairly young Roe Deer Buck has been in the field in front of the house for a few days now, no sheep in the field so it is allowing him to chew on the new grass shoots that are coming up (that means the lawn mower will soon be out 🙁 ) and this morning he decided to just sit down in the early sunshine and have a rest. Note his antlers are still in velvet so as the breeding season will soon be upon him he needs to reserve as much energy as possible.
24th
Noticed when one of the (we think) three Pine Martins came for it’s nightly feed that it had a nasty wound on it’s back, asked some of the experts on a forum I am on and the conclusion is it could either be a fight with another Martin or even a bird of pray attack, though it would have needed to be a Golden Eagle or maybe a Buzzard.
25th
The weather forecast was for snow today but not seeing any or rain today, so decided to do some outside work. I have four wood stores and depending on the maturity of the cut wood depends on which pile is next. Decided to bring the first batch of next Winters wood into the old coal shed just to give it a final seasoning before it will get used. This meant wheelbarrowing it from outside our front gate to the side of the house, then stacking it. Moved eight barrow loads and that has been my workout for the day, if not the week, afternoon off me thinks.
26th
Clocks have gone forward, I lost an hour of my beauty sleep and we woke up to a very cold North wind and the saying was right we did have a flurry of snow. So it has been the same all day, cold wind, sunshine followed by a small fall of snow, not the day to venture out beyond doing the necessary chores.
Just wanted to show you how far we are behind with our Daffodils, most are in the state you see above, going to be good and sturdy bulbs, just not ready to unfold from their warm covers (bit like me this morning).
Some singular ones in sheltered places are a wee bit more advanced.
While others are trying their hardest to put on a show.
After all sitting in front of a glowing log burner is far more sensible.
27th.
This morning started off with a temperature of minus six, but the day turned out to be a super sunny one, with the temperature now plus eight, it felt the right time to go for a walk up Glen Fender. Just before we parked the car (you didn’t think I would walk up the steepest hill when there was a road available did you?) we saw another buck Roe Deer. So I walked back to get a few shots of it. If you zoom in or look carefully you can see it has a scar towards the back of its belly. Not sure if that was a scrap with another buck or jumping over a fence or something. If you think I got this close to it , look at the next shot and see the beauty of having a zoom lens on the camera, as this shows the distance away I was.
I did walk a fair way up an adjacent hill and got this wonderful view up the glen with Blair Castle bottom left.
28th.
Last night the planets were all in line something you will not see again until twenty twenty four, so as usual I set my camera up to late and by the time I looked up on this wonderful clear night sky, the Moon, Venus and Mars were still in the sky but no longer inline. I decided to take one of Venus hand held on a long exposure, bracing myself on the side of the house thinking I should be able to hold the camera steady with no need for a tripod. Below was the rather hilarious result.
Looks more like a cartoon of Roadrunner on the right and the Coyote just about to eat him on the left. Well nobody is perfect and lessons were learnt.
31st.
Went up to Blair Walker lochan today, and disturbed these two (I think they are Pink Footed Geese) , they were not happy with me and were very vocal, just to let me know it was their grass and water.
Up date on the Pine Martin, we have not seen it at the feeders since, but as there is plenty of peanuts for after we go to bed it might as a precaution be coming out later.