Hogmanay:Swans a Swimming

Pale end of year sunshine catching the distant white wings of swans on flooded fields at Pitblae

The year ends with waterlogged and flooded fields providing temporary swimming pools for swans, ducks and geese, and with flocking pigeons, rooks, starlings and geese  scavenging in the stubble.

Philorth Woods: Boxing day walk

Sunlight on the treesby  North Lodge where noisy rooks were making seasonal adjustments to their nests and squabbling mildly. Elsewhere in the wood we heard strident pheasants, gently cooing pigeons and the chirping of the many small, highly active  small birds, tits and finches, in the trees, too rapid for precise identification.

The low sun caught the tree trunks and highlighted the red brick chimney of the old gas works by the pond.

Pale spears of wild garlic poking through the leaf litter, colourless but already  smelling faintly of garlic

Newly emerging lesser celandine leaves

Alders on the flooded north edge of Flagpole Plantation.

Possibly a male scaup (?)swimming on the flooded field

The field between the wood and Philorth Halt was completely under water, there was a flottila  of gulls and the single duck, pictured above, is it a scaup?

Christmas Greetings

Christmas Greetings from Grey Granite and Rufus to all their followers.

Christmas Eve walk

This morning was remarkably bright and sunny, a complete contrast to recent dreich days. We had intended to walk from Sandhaven up to Craigmire and back through Broomhills or Mains of Pitullie. However,  flooding on the road near  Craigmire promised  even more watery obstacles   down the farm roads. Yesterday the road to Rosehearty was closed and Phingask and Murison Drive, Rosehearty, was under a foot of water as the Swine Burn predictably failed to cope with the run off from waterlogged fields. This state of affairs is not new,  Grey Granite's friend recalls it happening  regularly since 1929.

We were prevented from walking towards Peathill from Sandhaven by this flood across the road at Craigmire.

Not a canal but the road down to Pittendrum awash with run off from the saturated fields.

Swamped fields behind the Mill of Sandhaven.

Along Shore Street in Sandhaven some houses had sandbags piled up against the front doors, the coping stones had been swept off the dyke, the drying greens were strewn with boulders which were being collected in baskets and thrown back into the sea. There were great banks of tangle and a scattering of rocks on the pavement at the Mill end of the village.  All this is nothing in comparison with the flooding  in Stonehaven where the River Carron burst its banks with devastating results and along the whole of the East Coast where roads and railways were under several feet of water. 

Flight Behaviour

Following the heavy rain of the past few days  hours every hollow has a temporary lochan and already there are dire predictions for next year's harvest of autumn sown grains. 

The spire of Fraserburgh South Church and the tower of the Dalrymple  Hall rise out of the haze over the sea.

Not as dramatic as the scenes at the shore a week ago, but there  was again a huge swell, huge piles of seaweed and other debris on the sand and swollen Kessock Burn gushes onto the sand.

Grey Granite is currently reading Barbara Kingsolver's excellent and thought provoking novel, Flight Behaviour. Against the background  of this disturbing novel of climate change the extreme weather patterns of the year  take on a more sinister aspect than just a run of seasonal storms.

Cairnhill Rosehearty: December Flowers

A cold but beautiful winter day with  a weak sun, high cloud and very little wind, hard to imagine the fury of the wind a few days ago. We took advantage of the good light and calm weather to walk 'Round the Horn' from Rosehearty. Cutting across the Cairnhill we were able to look down over the town to see the yellow digger and gang of workmen already repairing storm damage to the pier.

Along the short section of path from the War Memorial to Cairnhill Road we found these flowers still in bloom. daisies and gorse were also flowering, despite recent frosts and  the ravages of last weekend's storm.

Charlock (Sinapsis arvensis)

Chickweed (Stellaria media)

Dandelion (Taraxacum officinale)

White Fumitory (Fumaria capreolata)

Groundsel (Senecio vulgaris)

Purple Dead-nettle (Lamium purpureum)

Shepherd's Purse (Capsella bursa-pastoris)

Prickly sowthistle (Sonchus asper)

Ragwort (Senecio jacobaea)

Meanwhile, in the trees by Pitsligo Castle, rooks flew about their nests and quarreled noisily.

December daffodils

Not quite the shortest day but, already and encouragingly full of promise, daffodils at the base of  a warm, south facing dyke are pushing through the ground.