this northern boy

The title says it all really. A few paragraphs from almost a year ago, tidied up a little, mostly based on voice recordings I sometimes take on my walks.

September morning.

In the park, the sun just up, casting long shadows. The mist still clearing, revealing the distance. Above my head, feasting on berries, a Mistle Thrush, speckled and sunlit. In the distance something disturbs a crows’ roost. The crisp air filled with the silence-shattering calls of the black birds. Jays fly by, their broad wings carrying them, and a beak of acorns, from oak tree to oak tree. The red rump of a Greater Spotted Woodpecker stands out amongst the tired green of September trees.

The oaks look little different than they did in July. Perhaps just a little less vivid, and of course their fruits are falling by now. The Beech and Hornbeam stand in various states of undress. Some still clothed, some completely naked. The limes are turning yellow as the squirrels chase each other through their branches. The hawthorn berries are quickly succumbing to the appetites of Great Tits and Blue tits.

The comical yaffle of a Green Woodpecker, a noise like no other in the woodlands, reaches out across the cool morning air.

September afternoon.

The smell is different now too. Gone is the freshness of spring, or the hot dry scent of summer grass. It’s earthier now. The early fallen leaves already beginning to decay. Mushrooms appear everywhere from mossy clumps of grass to long downed trees. High up an old oak, the vivid yellow rills of Chicken of the Woods can’t help but catch your eye. 

Brambles are starting to swell and turn from green to red to black. Soon they’ll be sweet enough to pick. Wrens, so noisy in spring and summer, are quieter now hopping through the thorny shrubs searching for food. Two field mice dart and scurry beneath the same plant.

Out of the woods, and in to the grasslands of the park, here are the deer. Beautifully dappled Fallow, and the larger, more robust, Reds. The rut is still a month or so away, but the young stags are already starting to bellow and strengthen their neck muscles by twisting their antlers through the turf and bracken.

Over the river that bisects this side of the park, the last of the swallows still swoop. The swifts disappeared weeks ago, and the swallows won’t be long behind them. In the long grass along the riverbank, a tiny Grass Snake, barely thicker than a pencil, is coiled. The band around its neck bright but pale.

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