Far From the Madding Crowd

Thursday, 3 November 2016

Mudeford and the New Forest

We had a trip to Mudeford and the New Forest today. The autumn colours are brilliant this year, last year I don't think there was a lot of autumn colours because we had such awful wet and windy weather. The golden colour of the Beach trees in the New Forest are looking fantastic.

House Sparrow (Mudeford)

Starlings (Mudeford)

Pied Wagtail (Mudeford)

Wigeon (Mudeford)

A selection of pictures taken in the New Forest

Thursday, 6 October 2016

Camberwell Beauty butterfly

Just a very quick short post, there has been several reports of the butterfly, Camberwell Beauty, has been spotted in UK recently, so folks keep your eyes peeled open when you are out and about with your cameras, you may spot one :-)

http://www.ukbutterflies.co.uk/species.php?species=antiopa

Wednesday, 28 September 2016

Sad News about this Sparrowhawk

Very sad news of this sparrowhawk, we were pruning our jasmine today and my partner, Malcolm, said there is a dead sparrowhawk by the cherry tree, sadly it appears this sparrowhawk may have not been very successful in catching enough birds, because when I picked her up, I felt her breastbone and there was no meat, I could feel the breastbone and her ribs. Sadly this poor bird was probably getting weaker when I took this picture, it would explain why she did not fly off when she saw us taking pictures of her. I know we don't like sparrowhawks visiting our gardens but I did feel very sad when I picked her up, it shows that life can be tough for these birds.

My Blog

I have taken the title of my blog from Thomas Hardy's fourth novel 'Far From the Madding Crowd' which he wrote in 1874. He took his title from Thomas Gray's poem 'Elegy written in a Country Churchyard' completed in 1750. Thomas Hardy was born in Dorset where he lived for most of his life and where he based the stories in his novels. The word 'madding' means frenzied and there is a sense of freedom I get being out in the countryside and being close to nature away from the frenzied atmosphere of the towns and cities. I live in Dorset and like Thomas Hardy, it is where I have lived for most of my life, my blog is mostly about nature in Dorset. I am a member of the Dorset Wildlife Trust. I will include my garden and anything of interest about the natural world in Britain.