Tag: climate change
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Living and learning with swans
We are co-dependents, if you like. We don’t just want these beautiful birds to survive, we need them to. Symbols of nature’s resilience. Besides, the parents have shown imaginative skills of their own.
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Jack Frost welcomes proper winter to Pond Cottage
He’s at it again. That Jack Frost has turned another cold night into a glittery masterpiece on the bedroom window.
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Solstice sunrise, salute the turning of the year
I have my moments of despair, the doomster feeling that we’ve cooked ourselves a new dark ages. Yet, the sun is shining. After dreary days of relentless rain that alone would be worth getting out of bed for but there’s an extra pleasure in the knowledge that this marks a turning point in the year.…
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Gathering seeds of hope – on a train trip from Scotland to France
The ugly dark hulk has a daunting bulk. A grim legacy of the Nazi occupation. The old submarine base still occupies the Bacalan district of Bordeaux. So many tons of concrete – 600,000 cubic metres of them – would be difficult to remove. But walk round it and there’s a surprising softening in an imaginative…
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Pond Cottage nature notes – making a happy mess.
Too hot to do the outside work I had planned. I stay indoors with windows open to invite a cooling breeze while I tweak at words for next year’s Pond Cottage entry in Scotland’s Gardens Scheme 2026 Yellow Book. Is it right?
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The Resilience of Swans: Parenting Lessons from Pond Cottage
On another wet and windy day we return to Pond Cottage after a night away, pausing by the gate to check the postbox. And there’s a surprise package, a gift that brightens the gloom: a delightful sketch of our Mother Swan by the talented artist Rowena Millard.
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A Himalayan birch for Ronnie
“I just enjoy being among the mountains, that’s good enough, I don’t need to get to the top…” Ronnie Faux, born Burnley 8 November 1935, died Carlisle 16 July 2024. Before this turbulent 2024 ends, there’s still just time to add one more tree story. We have planted a Himalayan birch in memory of our…
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Four poems for a budget of winners and losers – what hope?
Who and where are life’s winners and losers? North, South, East, West, there’s precious little poetry in the words and numbers of budgets, but pausing for breath on edge of Winter Solstice darkness, here’s a selection of poems drawing on a wealth of experience, the kind of human insight that could enhance political debate – and…
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Plants, pollinators, people: welcome to the Pond Garden
How to plan and plant for wildlife in our new climate of uncertainty? I’m searching for ideas in the era of adaptation. There’s great advice from experts but I can also learn a lot from close encounters with the pollinators feasting on self-sown flowers at Pond Cottage. Great opportunists. True survivors.
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Close encounters with birds: our best start to the day
Possibly our most enjoyable experience at Pond Cottage. Counting birds has a serious scientific purpose but in a world of human chaos, I find few sights more cheering than close encounters with these beautiful unblinking creatures. Thank you @BTO_Scotland
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Every tree tells a story at Pond Cottage
Planting a tree is to have hope for the future… The old oak tree The story so far. On a sunny afternoon in May a small group gathered among the trees at Pond Cottage to explore how storytelling can reconnect people with the natural world. And what we all gain when we do.
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Tree stories stir hearts and perhaps a sense of hope
I hadn’t expected to be quite so engrossed. For the next two hours I never once thought about taking my phone out of my pocket