Temporary respite

Although only slight in nature, the rains have allowed the forests streams to flow again, even if thinly and only temporarily, it's respite for the woodland and its inhabitants. It's freshened the air a bit too.

Re-growth

I've watched with interest as this part of Wilverley has changed. Initially the Sweet Chestnuts were removed, leaving the woodland open and exposed, soon after the Sweet Chestnut stumps sent up multiple rods and a blanketing coppice developed obscuring the woodland, now, some years on, the rods have reached for the skies, growing up tall and revealed the woodland once more. The forest is always changing. Most interesting though, isn't here where the hand of man has agency in change, but where man has withdrawn from 'managing' the landscape and nature is allowed to chart her own course.  Still, interesting to watch cycles in motion.

Carpet @ The Winchester Gate, Salisbury, 26.7.18

I've picked up a few set lists over recent years, although never anything like this unique info-graphic set list, how cool is this! Accurate too. And, the band? One of Salisbury's finest...Carpet. Carpet are a high quality psychedelic beat combo, a band we first saw supporting west coast maestros Carlton Melton a couple of years ago. We like them. For good reason, they play a very nice line in improvised grooves, I say improvised, clearly there's a plan (the images is evidence), but you can tell by the way the band throw glances at each other that there's an element of flexibility and freedom in their performance. I felt jazz stylings as the individual band members did their things, before blending into a fabulous psychedelic whole, it was proper immersive stuff too. I don't know much background on the band, although I do know guitarist Darren also plays with those Salisbury stalwarts of 60's flavoured psyche The Neighbourhood Strange. Clearly all the musicians are proficient in their art, each band member bringing their best to the table, and all looking to be having fun. The drummer was interesting, there was something decidedly punk about his style and delivery which certainly added to the energy, the other guitarist too was really throwing himself into it...they all were. We were blown away, the whole room were loving it. As the info graphic suggests, so it was. A psyche explosion sent all the musicians hurtling out into space on their own courses, slowly coalescing into a lovely mellow groove, before the beat kicked in and a sumptuous heavy groove took hold, and that really was a lovely heavy groove to finish. Bravo! My only complaint, I wanted more. Another top night at another one of our 'not so local locals' (The Winchester Gate, Salisbury), not so not local as our primary 'not so local local' (The King Arthur, Glastonbury), but still not a local really as to be described as local. I digress. Carpet have changed and most definitely grown since we first saw them a couple of years ago, and they may well have been the support this evening, but I'd happily have turned out just to see them, and hope to catch them again real soon.Check them out here.

Bifrost, maybe?

A rainbow shines through a cloud waterfall, either that or it's the Bifrost, and Asgard's eyes are upon us.

Adder

Right in the middle of the main track across St Catherine's Hill, a young Adder (Vipera berus) makes its way slowly into the emerging day (I was out early today). Our only poisonous snake, they say the young small ones give the worst bite, whether that's an urban myth, I don't know and am not eager to find out.  

The Hill

When I first visited St Catherine's Hill is was pretty much all scorched earth and charcoal trees. It was late 1976, after the long hot summer and its accompanying fires, and it remained charred for the next few years. Then in subsequent years self seeded pine, gorse and the dreaded rhododendron invaded, colonized and eventually consumed the hill. It remained like that for years, all choked up. Though in recent times, through the work mostly of volunteers, the hill has been born again. Gone are the invasive flora, the landscape opened up, the heathland flora and fauna are recolonizing.  I imagine the landscape looks much as it should do. It was nice to see it so invigorated, something long overdue. 

Burley Old

Burley Old enclosure 1700.

Seed head

Stream side seed head.

Full of chickens!

The forest is very dry, that's established, which makes the abundance of Chicken of the Woods about even more surprising. Why? More though, how? Where are they getting the energy, and liquid from, what with fungi being mostly water. Really! I've not known such a season with so much Chicken of the Woods, no matter where you look there are flashes of yellow/orange. All of the examples I've come across are perfect too. Usually they're flawed or damaged or faded in some way, though that doesn't appear the case this season. Maybe, these are the perfect conditions for Chicken of the Woods. It's quite a sight.

Sloe

The forest may be dry, though one of the streams still flowing well is Red Rise Brook and as a consequence the fruits on stream side shrubs a filling out nicely.

Express yourself

Youth expressing themselves, leaving their marks on a stack of harvested timber in Ferny Knapp enclosure. Although in two separate places on an extensive stack, both sets would appear to be made by the same six individuals; one jokey, one proper. D of E hikers I reckon, it's the right size group, and I can't imagine you getting that many young folk out into the forest any other way. Bless 'em.

Like a dog to water

For Geoff's first encounter with a stream we went to Mill Lawn. Without hesitation, and with a lot of excitement, Geoff was straight in, and before long out of his depth and swimming. Handy really, it'll save me having to wash him down after those wet and muddy winter walks.

Duck Hole

The heatwave continues, and forest dries out further. Or so it appears. No, that's being disingenuous, the forest is really dry on the whole, though if you venture off the beaten track, off into the heathland hollows you'll find them still wet, and a filigree of rivulets being fed by hidden springs still flowing well.  Take Duck Hole Bog here, in a fold below what was Markway enclosure (now clear felled and harvested), verdant and lovely, clear tannin tinged water bubbling along in stark contrast to the increasingly parched open heath around it. Definitely, a place to sit a while and take in the summer forest.

Going nuts.

We've a couple of Hazelnuts and a Cobnut in the garden, and last autumn I cut the rods out of them, leaving the parent trees unscathed. Doing that I assumed we wouldn't have much of a crop  of nuts this year...in the case of the Cobnut, I was mistaken. The Cobnut tree is more laden with fruits than I've ever seen it, good sized fruits too. Cobnuts are a corylus cultivar, very like the Hazelnut (corylus avellana) though propagated for much larger fruit, two maybe three times the size of the common hazelnut. I'll watch with interest how the fruits develop, as in years past the fruit case may have been well developed, though the fruit inside was not. Still, if they do come to fruition, we'll have quite a crop.

Dawn walking

The introduction of Geoff into my life has radically altered my routines, I've now become the dawn treader, out walking over the dew covered common by 0630. Don't misunderstand me, I'm not moaning, it's nice to see the early hours of day and nature waking. Well, other being thoroughly moist with dew on my return, that is. As currently the common is furnished with above head height bracken, rose bay willow herb and grasses. An island of wild in a suburban setting, really, it quite a wild place.

Cool invader

The cool flower of a Red Bottlebrush (Callistemon) plant way out in the forest, clearly an invader, although lovely nevertheless, this species originates in Australia where it's endemic. Not something you'd commonly see out and about in an English wood.

The ponds

I popped by the 'Ponds' today, and although the ponds are all desiccated, the surrounding landscape remains verdant and thriving. I think the site was originally chosen for a wildfowl reserve as it's a spring head.  It's like a strange oasis in the forest, so different in nature to all that surrounds it.

Black Water? What water!

Black Water? What water! No, there's little or no water! The forest continues to desiccate as the summer intensifies. Some of the forests streams are showing their bare bottoms. Black Water and Highland Water, both tributaries of the Lymington River, are dry but for a few greasy and fetid pools. Although, I'm sure the streams still flow silent and greatly reduced below the exposed gavels to the eye their invisible. Makes you wonder though, how'll the forest cope with climate change if it manifests as longer hotter/drier summers.

Ober heath hide

This shooters hide, camouflaged amongst a few young trees, is the largest I've come across in the forest. They're usually one person affairs, although this one could easily accommodate 2 or 3 shooters, and makes a perfect rest spot with excellent views (you have to ignore the 'no public' sign, but that's not hard). People have asked 'why are the forest deer shot?'.  Well, it because nothing is as natural as it looks, the forest landscapes you see have been created over millennia of human exploitation and manipulation. Or to put it bluntly...it's not natural. Heathland, was created when agriculture was adopted (in some places it would have been an existing niche environment, subsequently expanded) and the wild wood cleared, the soils productivity failed quickly and more wild wood was cleared. Heath once spread over huge areas of Britain, although now it's becoming an increasingly rare and protected environment. If it's not managed nature would once again assert herself, improving the impoverished soils, reinstating woodland, and heathland would disappear or return to niche pockets. Controlling the deer population is part of that management, as another aspect of our historical interfering was the disruption of natural equilibrium through the extermination of species. Once wolves, along with hunting, would have managed deer populations, now they need to be regularly culled.  The New Forest authority are performing a balancing act, they need conditions just so. They need natures attempts at reforestation curbed, although not to the extent of no new reforestation. Nature once had it sorted.  But we had to stick our oar in, we really are a disruptive and destructive species.

Rhinefield Sandy's

Rhinefield Sandy's enclosure has been fenced off for years now (some forestry project or other), high deer proof fencing making it an isolated island immune to deer or pony assault. You can see the difference too, it must be 20 years now, and the under-story is thick and impenetrable in places. With no public access either, no humans has also meant that, but for the main forestry track, the paths have all but been reclaimed by the forest. This used to be favoured walking of ours, and it was on this path that our eldest said his first word 'tree'. Over the intervening years I've scaled the fencing on several occasions and explored the undisturbed stands, watching the changes and wondering when the fences will come down and access restored. 

Loving it

Geoff's first impressions of the forest, were that he like it. I think he can see the potential fun to had there, and he's yet to discover the streams.

Helium by Custard Flux

He's only gone and done it again! Who? The Luck of Eden Hall's Gregory Curvey. Man, I swear, the guy's a creative Midas or something, all his offerings to date have been pure gold. Curvey's back with his latest project 'Custard Flux', a project born with the acquisition of a dilapidated 100 year old Harmonium. He restored the harmonium (music not being the only string to his creative bow), bringing the ailing instrument back to life, and going on to create the album 'Helium' around it. Helium by Custard Flux is another Curvey masterpiece, again as with The Luck of Eden Hall, he's forging pure aural bliss. From the opening track 'The Hit Parade', a jaunty number, the harmonium conjuring images of yore, dancing dandies and masked ladies, juxtaposed with a distinctly psychedelic dream pop flavour, you know you're in for a treat. And you're not wrong, the melodic adventure continues throughout this great album. Like a musical magpie with alchemical powers he gathers elements from the myriad corners of the progressive/psyche universes and creates something uniquely Curvey, it runs through his work like Brighton through rock. That distinctive Curvey vocal too, man, weaves lyrically through the album, like a tonal watermark. There's all sorts going on in this album, echoes of early 70's Canterbury on some tracks, like 'The Shire of Gingin', whose opening guitar put me in mind of bands like 'The Audience'. And, there are nods to those later grand mid 70's prog opuses too, in the depth and scale of sound Curvey constructs. Then he'll change tack, with a number like 'Tiger', with its jangly guitar reminiscent of that 80's psychedelic pop sound, or a burst of good solid psyche rock as on 'Forevermore'. So many interesting musical paths explored, so many wells sipped from, a musical tour de force served as only Curvey knows how. Filled to the brim with ideas, every track's a delight, which carry you dreamily along with a smile on your face...this is such a beautifully chilled out album, man. Custard Flux sits comfortably on a sumptuous chaise lounge of psychedelia, shining, propped up with plump prog cushions, and draped in a brightly coloured pop throw, one reverent eye on the past, the other gazing excitedly into the future. An example of contemporary psychedelia at its loveliest, and all performed on acoustic instruments, yeah I know, yet another layer of wonder. The title track 'Helium' happens to be the last track, an apt cherry for such a delightfully rich cake of an album. Man, it's a gorgeous sunset track of dreamy shoegaze/ psyche pop, which in the end softly dissipates like a vapour, album done. Perfect. From start to finish there's no filler, and throughout the album the reinvigorated harmonium adds all sorts of groovy dimensions to that already established Gregory Curvey sound. Curvey played all the instruments and wrote the whole thing too! A musical Madrox, if you will. You want my advice, push the pie to one side and fill up on custard, it's delicious and nutritious, open your ears and let Curvey feed you minds. I'm absolutely loving this Album. A digital version is available on bandcamp, with a vinyl release to come, and you'll have to get behind me in the queue for that. Buy this album!

Mast

The Beech mast is looking the best I've seen it in years, no, the  best I remember, actually. The boughs are weighed down with large fruits, and lots of them too, whole trees festooned with them. Notably, I observed that for the most part the Oaks in forest are nearly all void of acorns, or if the acorns are there they are very small. I wonder if there's some connection, a good year for one is a bad year for another. I know there are patterns out there, I see glimpses of them, what's really needed is to join all the dots up in the hope of creating a more complete picture. Something else noticeable is the proliferation of tiny sampling Oaks about the forest, wonderful to see, although I have to wonder how many will survive. Still. Aren't trees amazing. With the mast looking so good this season, I suppose I should be thinking about what could be done with them. I know they're edible and have been crushed to produce oil, though that sounds bloody laborious, they're only small and a bugger to process...or, it could be I just don't know the right method. I may to look into that. Or, a pesto type thing maybe?