AUGUST - "Here, where the reaper was at work of late, In this high field's dark corner..."

Here, where the reaper was at work of late,
In this high field's dark corner, where he leaves
His coat, his basket, and his earthen cruise,
And in the sun all morning binds the sheaves,
Then here, at noon, comes back his stores to use;
Here will I sit and wait,
While to my ear from uplands far away
The bleating of the folded flocks is borne,
With distant cries of reapers in the corn  -
All the live murmur of a summer's day.

 

from "The Scholar Gypsy" by Matthew Arnold

Summer 2025 will certainly be remembered for the high temperatures, storms and wildfires!

For me, August is a month apart from other months. Here, in north west Caithness, it is a month of green and golden hillsides - the green peppered with the dark and pied shadows of cattle as they munch, munch, and masticate their way through the rich grass. Some fields have sheep - those pretty lambs which delighted us in early spring are now strong and solid and no longer babies. The golden fields appear amber in the evening sunlight. The wood pigeons, with full crops, launch themselves from the brilliant slopes. 

August leaves me with a strange feeling. I think it's a sense of completion and gratitude mixed with a little apprehension. While summer isn't over, it's making its way towards the equinox - the time of high winds and that strange balance between day and night. 

Each and every month has something special. I think my favourite months are May and October but there is something to recommend all months. 

"August brings the sheaves of corn, then the harvest home is born."

(The Garden Year" by Sara Coleridge)

Well of course they're rarely sheaves anymore - but I remember well when they were!

My brother, Mike, playing in our lane at Studcross Cottage, showing the field before the railway embankment. (1960)

When I was two my family moved from a very small, very old Dutch house on Battlegreen, Epworth to Studcross Cottage which was not far away at all. My bedroom was above a small barn attached to the house and had a window looking over the yard/garden as well as a window opposite which had a clear view of the mere (absolutely dried up by that time) and the fields away towards Burnham. It may have been very draughty but I have lovely memories of watching men, in the field closest, skilfully harvesting the corn. When they had finished, the field was a late summer picture of sheaves and wood pigeons gleaning seeds. Families of mice scurried everywhere - homeless but not hungry! Weasels were on the lookout for an easy meal. Back then the old people missed the horses. Now I miss the reapers. The modern combines were a wonderful invention though. Progress! I clearly remember watching my first combine harvester in operation - Dad took me to see Uncle Peter Temperton (I had two Uncle Peters!), working what appeared to be a monster, in a field off the Wroot road where he farmed the rich dark soil. I can still feel the amazement - for an untravelled country girl this was a colossus! 

Watching the farmers harvesting ahead of Storm Floris reminded me of the effect of August storms on the cereal crops when I was growing up. There was a sense of abandonment - and a great sense of loss. The fields were flattened and, until the new strains of cereal were certified and everyone had access to a colossus, this would continue to be the case. There was little that could be done to remedy the situation.

This year's August Harvest

Science and technology have significantly helped farmers - and ultimately consumers. All things in moderation and moderation in all things, however!!

The cocktails of poisons developed in laboratories across the world have filtered into our food chain at an alarming rate - and the negligence at best, cruelty at worst, that becomes apparent on looking at the way the countryside and its fauna and flora have been treated as a result is appalling.

Now that we have our honey bees living in the little wood, we are on the lookout for fungi, parasites and predators - some of which can wipe out a colony in a matter of hours. But the damage which can be done by agrichemicals can't be overlooked either. We're fortunate here, in West Caithness, because many farmers are reducing their use. In our garden we plant for bees and all insects - as well as for birds. We never use chemicals so slugs can be a problem but at least two hedgehogs visit regularly now and we also have frogs and toads. They all help the war effort! 

At the beginning of August we spent Sunday, 3rd, getting ready for Storm Floris. Normally, ahead of the autumn, we batten down the hatches here in the far north of Britain. When we moved to Orkney in 1986, we learned the hard way! By the time broken pieces of a neighbour's caravan were flying past our window we had learned our lesson and there was nothing we could have done about that!!

Storm Floris, however, was a bit out of season but we had heeded the warnings of meteorologists and put loose things into places of shelter as well as tying up plants to minimise damage.

Floris Day dawned on Monday, 4th, and it was only windy when I phoned my mum, in Lincolnshire, at 3pm. During the conversation the wind speed increased and, by the time we all went to bed, the damage to the garden was already apparent. The power had failed when I had two pies in the oven. We were without power for about twenty five hours.

A large part of the horse chestnut separated itself from the rest of the tree and so many other trees were broken in part.

The next day, Tuesday, 5th, I went out early into the cottage garden and felt a real sense of loss. I remembered the sinking feeling, after the summer storms of August, when I looked out of the kitchen window at Studcross Cottage, all those years ago, towards the railway embankment and saw the flattened cereal crop which separated our little lane from the, by then, seldom used railway.

Then and now it seemed as if we had lost summer! I think "devastation" might be a good word to describe the sight I saw here in the cottage garden. Not devastation in the brutalised sense - like the Palestinian people see when they peer from their makeshift shelters - but devastation in the sense of "What have we done to cause these crazy weather patterns all over the world? Have we entered a new phase in decline?"

Four photos of early morning, late summer, post Floris

At that moment my little forever-friend, Bob Robin, came - just to say he hadn't forgotten me and that we will see this through together. 

Ginny, Judith and Clemency worked all that day and the next day too. They were cutting things which had been unevenly broken off, dragging away massive branches, sawing them and generally tidying up. Good job they were on holiday!

I did some securing in the cottage garden too. Nothing like as much as they were doing - they seemed tireless! They were still sorting out things on the Friday too.

By Sunday, 10th, the growing things were showing signs of perking up. I'd hoped for this but hadn't dared to expect it. The Poet's Wife, a wonderfully scented yellow rose, instead of growing upwards, now seems to want to wander. Is this a result of Storm Floris? I noticed this with other roses too. I wonder if there is some communication by which they know that, after such a shock, they can't recover unless they adjust their regular growth habit to accommodate the lateness of the season??

Adjustments are needed across the board in August. While the garden is recovering from Storm Floris, the young toads are getting brave and leaving the relative safety of the water. They need to go through this risky stage in order to prepare for the autumn. Toads are our friends. We actually rely on them to keep down the slugs. I think I would welcome them even if they didn't! They are curious little critters - ponderous and trusting. The fully grown toads we see here often make me think of Toad of Toad Hall from The Wind in the Willows (Kenneth Grahame). Toad was, I think, cleverly developed in the story - so much so that he reminds me of the middle class land owners I knew as a child. They were financially secure and would have been able to override the August storms - unlike the farmers in our family's circle who were under tremendous pressure to get back on their feet. Mr.Toad was wealthy and pompous and followed his obsessions into the realm of the ridiculous - but - he had a heart of gold underneath - and that was his redeeming feature - that and the fact that he eventually learned from his mistakes!

Two froggy (toady?) pics

Our swallows abandoned all their nest sites except the ones in the garage. They tried to build in the outdoor larder - that was probably too low. They tried to build around the light in the storm porch at the front of the house - although we don't often use that entrance, the swallows would be able to see movement inside through the inner half-glazed door. They are still using their nest sites in the garage - and making us jump as they perform their aerial wheelies in and out! There'll be some big-time cleaning up needed when they have gone back to Africa!  At present though, there is no sign that they will be leaving any time soon. We watch them dive-bombing the fields around us and they don't go away hungry either - there are still many, many insects for them.

I heard them at breakfast time on Wednesday (27th). I sat outside, switched on my phone and went to my Merlin app which tells me the names of the birds I am listening to. I used it for three minutes and these are the birds I heard:

sparrow,  goldfinch,  robin,  dunnock,  chaffinch,  wren,  siskin,  swallow,  linnet,  starling and jay.

Except for the swallow, we should be able to keep all of those birds through winter. I will miss the swallows when they leave - and I will miss the willow warblers too. I've often watched them through the French windows and noticed  that their habits are a bit wren-like - although they are quite different in appearance. They will come quite close to the house and scrutinise the area around the birdbath which stands there. It isn't always water they want - sometimes they seem to be eating insects from underneath the bowl.

Greenfinch with red beak

Ginny photographed a greenfinch with a partly red beak. It was on the feeder. She did some research and found that they sometimes have red beaks but that it is quite unusual.

We have baby quails! They are adorable, little balls of fluff on legs, and growing very quickly.  There are five - three in the orchard run and two in the hutch which is in the kitchen garden. There were three in the hutch but sadly one died. We think Mummy perhaps squashed it. Too much love!!!

Mummy and Baby Unit

Jessie wants to play with them of course - but that would be a disaster  - again a case of too much love - for a spaniel!

Jumping Jess

We are seeing more fungi as the summer comes nearer to its close. On a walk up to the windfarm we noticed one that neither Clemency nor I could identify until we got home and took out the reference books. It seemed to be Hygrophorous coccineus, "Scarlet Hood". It is tiny and bright - the shade is slightly orange of red -and it is very delicate. 

There are some bright yellow ones - not much bigger - living on the lawn at the front of the house. They're shaded by the young beech hedge which Clemency planted early in 2023. 

This month we have had some magical starts to the day - the early morning mist lit by the sun. One such morning I looked through the pantry window and watched the cows and sheep grazing the fields between us and the windmills which were reaching, tall and white into the misty moisty morning.

Nigella / Love In A Mist (Gertrude Jekyll's favourite flower)

Another morning, at breakfast, we were treated to a wonderful display - four young deer playing zoomies in the unoccupied meadow next door - with the mist rolling backwards and forwards and back again behind them.

We are living through dark times. Those who still feel love for their fellow human beings are powerless to help the suffering ones. And those who foresaw the drastic climate change which is affecting our planet right now are saddened by the inaction that allowed it to happen. Please don't stop speaking out against injustice - whether it affects people directly or indirectly. I believe we can turn the light back on if we hold fast to that which is good.

On the ferry, coming home from Orkney, Judith and her friend saw dolphins jumping and playing in the water. I always think healthy dolphins are a hopeful sign that "all shall be well and all shall be well and all manner of things shall be well in the end" (Julian of Norwich, 14th and 15th century mystic). We can do this thing!! 

The Ice Plant (Sedum) - still in the pink!

Summer isn't over until the ice plant (a sedum) turns a rich deep pink. It's still a delicate shade of rose. 

 

Now sleeps the crimson petal, now the white;
Nor waves the cypress in the palace walk;
Nor winks the gold fin in the porphyry font.
The firefly wakens; waken thou with me.

Now droops the milk-white peacock like a ghost,
And like a ghost she glimmers on to me.

 Now lies the Earth all Danaë to the stars,
And all thy heart lies open unto me.

 Now slides the silent meteor on, and leaves
A shining furrow, as thy thoughts in me.

Now folds the lily all her sweetness up,
And slips into the bosom of the lake.
So fold thyself, my dearest, thou, and slip
Into my bosom and be lost in me. 

This poem, by Alfred Lord Tennyson, was set to music by Roger Quilter. My daughters have sung this over the years and it remains a personal favourite.