First week of November

Friday the First of November 2013

Two of my four cats have decided to establish strange places as their primary residences.

Squeak, a 95% black female, has commandeered a spot on top of the kitchen cupboards …

 
 
 

… while Kipper, 100%black male, is vertically below her on top of the microwave.

 
 
 

Meanwhile there’s not a lot going on outside.

Long tailed tits are really, I mean really, cute.

 
 
 

Down the canal at the mews you’re being watched:

 
 
 

Grebes are still on t’pond:

Memories

Betty Botter bought some butter,
Betty said: “This butter’s bitter.
“If I mix this bitter butter
“With my bit of better butter,
“It will make my better butter bitter”

There’s a lot of slightly different versions out there, most involving bitter batter, but this is how I remember it.

Then there was ‘Little Miss Bouncer’ who ‘Loved an announcer, down at the BBC’

 
 
 

Saturday the twoth

Anyhow, enough of this: on with the pics:
Here’s the grebes – both adults with the two remaining youngsters – the other two having done the buggerin’ off.

 
 
 

Are robins alone in being territorial at this time of year?

 
 
 

Lichens are beginning to show as the leaves fall. This was on a willow by the canal.

 
 
 

A young swan arrived as we (that’s Ian [twitter: @Watts127] and me) walked round the pond:I think it was too big to be still called a cygnet (?).

Later it was doing swanny things:

Sunday

Grebes, canal, ex-pigeon, cyclists and a beautiful conker.

No!

No sun–no moon!
No morn–no noon!
No dawn–no dusk–no proper time of day–
No sky–no earthly view–
No distance looking blue–
No road–no street–no “t’other side this way”–
No end to any Row–
No indications where the Crescents go–
No top to any steeple–
No recognitions of familiar people–
No courtesies for showing ’em–
No knowing ’em!
No travelling at all–no locomotion–
No inkling of the way–no notion–
“No go” by land or ocean–
No mail–no post–
No news from any foreign coast–
No Park, no Ring, no afternoon gentility–
No company–no nobility–
No warmth, no cheerfulness, no healthful ease,
No comfortable feel in any member–
No shade, no shine, no butterflies, no bees,
No fruits, no flowers, no leaves, no birds–
November!

Thomas Hood

Not generally true though, November has, by and large*, been pretty good weatherwise. (so far; touch wood)

*(There’s something I didn’t know: that’s a nautical expression; “by” meant sailing into the wind while “large” was going with the wind. hence “by and large” means, roughly, “under any circumstances”)

Monday

Pond & canal (yawn!). Crossed over to Shireoaks road at Highground Bridge, just below Deep Lock. Walked up the road as far as Haggonfields Lock. Coming back down the towpath I snuck through the hedge into the environs of the C&RT sludge pond, the zillions of teasels never fail to attract me.
When I go to the pond I take a pic from the same spot every time. I might schloosh ’em all together to make a gif or a movie later.

 
 

There’s a privet bush a short way round the pond that’s home to a flock of sparrows.

 
 

The steps, made from old railway sleepers, that take the path from waterside to the high path past the school, have a few occasional fungi …

 
 

… and the footpath back down, surrounded by bramble bushes, has views of distant autumnal trees which get more vivid as time passes.

 
 

The adult grebes are getting rid of the kids and starting to be a couple again. (Yup, I’m playing with the movie thing on my Nikon again – sorry)

 
 

Up the canal:
Reflected willow.

 
 

The wireworks are spending millions of pounds on new buildings. These are some of the oversize cotton bobbins parked in their yard. I’d assumed that they made cables for electricity but I’m told they made cables for e.g. hauling cages up and down coal mines. The bottom dropped out of that market some thirty years ago. Wonder if they do suspension bridges and the like.

 
 

In the front of one of the companies along Shireoaks road a couple of jays were flirting. (not a good pic: took me by surprise)Don’t get many jays round the pond, in fact I can only recall seeing one in the seven or so years I’ve been here, so these attracted me.

 
 

Back down the towpath and into the “teasel field”:One teasel …

 
 

… a lot of teasels.

 
 

There were a surprising number of red common darter dragonflies around and over the water.

 
 

Even the dead leaves of teasels have their appeal – these looked more like miniature rams horns than anything.

 
 

Another darter …… and a pair “at it”.

 
 

Back on the canal:
Looking down to Deep Lock and Highground Bridge.

Autumn reflection.

Ladybird on barrier post.

Mallard in a flap.

 
 

Diversion

“(It’s lookin’) black over Bill’s mother’s.” Apparently, according to t’internet, this is a Nottinghamshire expression. Don’t like to disagree with such an authority, but I used to hear it in Sheffield regularly when I were a kid.
For anyone uncertain about its meaning: “bad weather is coming as there are dark clouds in the distance”.
Who Bill was and why his mother lived “over there”, I have no idea.

 
 

Tuesday

No change: pond & canal.

Remember, remember, the fifth of November
Gunpowder, treason and plot;
I see of no reason why gunpowder, treason
Should ever be forgot.

Most folk “celebrated” bonfire night last weekend. My cats cowered in sundry places.

Blackbirds on twig.

 
 

Young grebe practising before “doin’ the buggerin’ off”.

 
 

Fungus has interesting shapes and shades, no?

 
 

Shopping trolley in Morse Lock. Tweeted C&RT and it was lifted next morning.

 
 

“Black as a tar barrel”

 
 

The lake is bloody beautiful!

 
 

Kestrel before and after a bit of photo-manipulation.

 
 

Young grebe …

… and here’s one of the adults with a fish.

 
 

Wednesday

The heron was on the pond next to the ducks’ basking and feeding point.
Just by the way, that’s a piece of old carpet that the heron’s standing on. Someone kindly chucked it in a few years ago. Not a bad pic, though I say it myself.

 
 

Closer.

 
 

Tufted ducks are increasing in numbers as they come here to overwinter.Male …

… and female tufties.

 
 

Robins are territorial in autumn. Their song is shorter and more staccato at this time of year.

 
 

This gull was pecking at haws on the canal bank. Not seen ’em doing that before.

 
 

A somewhat less shy robin sitting on the fence around Morse Lock’s bywash.

 
 

Strange how some hawthorns are absolutely covered in fruit while others have none.

 
 

Ivy blossoms and fruits later than almost anything, providing food for wasps and flies braving the cooler weather.

 
 

Don’t know how, or why, folk have the nerve to go up in one of those.

 
 

Bullrushes. I just like ’em

 
 

Juvenile grebe practising again.

 
 

I have no idea whether this is reed, rush, or grass, but it’s pretty.

 
 

Gulls hover over and skulk around grebes hoping to nick fish when they surface.

Thursday the seventh of November

Up to and round Lady Lee; as well as round t’pond and down to town on t’canal.
Just by the way: when I use “t’” -it’s not actually a “T” – more a sort of varying combination of “T“,”D” and “UH” depending on context.Have a grebe.

 
 

Peaceful scene.

 
 

Two views of a kestrel hunting.

 
 

I wonder which happens first; the wood dying or the lichen colonising. Or are they independent?

 
 

Alder, female and male “flowers”.

 
 

A campion of some kind (I think).

 
 

What happens to thistles after the thistledown has left.

 
 

Lady Lee lake.

 
 

Still flowering.

 
 

It’s almost impossible to get a picture of this tree without intervening overhead power lines. I’ve tried for ages and finally managed this. I think it was worth it.

 
 

Remnants of cow parsley.

 
 

Towpath with a carpet of haws.

 
 

Tiny yellow flowers.

 
 

The adults. Alone at last?

 
 

Not bad for a hand held daytime shot?

 
 

Fin

That’s week one done – might get around to week 2 before week 3’s out 🙂