Dockens Water

 

Autumn colours reflected in Dockens Water.

Dead Man Oak

'Dead Man Oak' reads the shallow carved graffiti on a towering veteran leviathan in Mark Ash Wood. Thing is, it's a veteran beech rather than an oak.

Our seasonal shroom

I've seen quite a few nibbled or trodden examples, though this is the first complete small capped Fly Agaric I've seen this season. The iconic mushroom of midwinter and Christmas, from whence much of our seasonal folklore and imagery originates.

Knight Wood

The forest is full of magical hidden places, places that are a little off the beaten track, the places in-between, overlooked and rarely trodden. Places where you seldom, if ever, see others, and connection to woods and nature is easy. These are some of my favourite places, as they retain a certain something only felt, impossible to articulate. Above, a restored Warwickslade cutting meanders through the misty stands of Knight Wood; the restoration has resulted in the woodland slowly becoming waterlogged... it's welly country, and will only get wetter as the effects of restoration bed in. Knight Wood is unenclosed deciduous old forest, the oldest tracts being those of majestic veteran beech on the, slightly, higher ground, more recent the mature oaks through which Warwickslade cutting flows (they date somewhere in the 1800's, and drainage). Some of these oaks are not liking the wetter aspects of the restored landscape one bit, their broken limbs litter the woodland floor and several of the trees are looking rather peaky. Full restoration to bog woodland will be a long journey mind, it'll take decades for these oaks to be replaced by returning carr species. You know, I don't remember ever seeing another soul amongst these oaks, I'm sure there must be other visitors, and maybe they're thinking that they've never seen anybody here either.

Burley Old

I never tire of the natural beauty Burley Old manifests.

 

Aw nuts!

 

As I was saying regards pannage, the Sweet Chestnuts (Castanea sativa) this year have been rubbish. Traditionally, for me anyway, the fringes of Backley Enclosure have always been prime chestnut collecting woodland, and I don't remember it ever being so poor there. Yeah, there were  a handful of gooduns here and there, but no real corkers, and for the most part they've been little more than empty leathery sacks. Same everywhere we've roamed too. I hope it's an anomaly and not a sign of things to come... you do get good and bad years after all.

Pannage 2021

F*ck off! That's what Mrs Pig was saying, and what we did shortly after taking the photo as Mrs Pig took a dislike to Geoff and I. Not wishing to cast aspersions on Geoff, but I think it was him who Mrs Pig wanted gone rather than I. There were piglets in the group, and she was obviously taking no chances. It'll be a thin year's feasting this pannage for the forest's pigs, none of the forest's nuts have come to much.

Beefsteak

As a large Beefsteak fungi decays on the woodland floor, it's easy to see how it got it's name. Although, I think 'porksteak' may be more appropriate, as I think the fungi's flesh looks akin to pulled pork.

Vinny Ridge

 Vinney Ridge is home to some wonderfully gnarly veteran trees, tenacious buggers every one.

Boss...da plane, da plane!

This morning the sky above Duck Hole Bottom had me wondering if I'd inadvertently stepped through a time portal into late summer 1940. No matter in which direction you looked the sky was criss crossed by vapour trails. It's not the Battle Britain though, it's a sign of our collective cognitive dissonance in a far more wide ranging battle for humanity's very survival. 

 

I don't know about you, but after being politically and environmentally conscious, and to a degree active, since my teens I find myself despairing of the empty narratives of both.  I have to agree with Thunburg's 'blah, blah, blah' comment at COP26, and I don't see it confined to government and corporate green-wash either. As far as I can see it's most everyone and everything. The whole carbon neutral narrative, plant based everything, growing 'green' economies, sustainability through technological innervations, all smoke and mirrors, comforting bullshit, a deception we're happy to be complicit in. Evangelical believers if truth were known, after all, it's our lifestyles on the line, and no matter our words our actions betray the truth. We wag our fingers at corporations and government demanding change, and then happily accept their green-washed platitudes as just enough to sooth our consciences and allow us continue our destructive habits. If Covid has taught us anything, it's that society lacks commonality and is reluctant to change it's hedonistic self serving habits, even as death stalks the streets people raged that a hiatus in their consuming had been foist upon them, and, as soon as was possible returned to the free market trough...imagine when the climate mitigation penny drops...#shitstorm! In my opinion consumption, or rather the excesses there of,  is the enormous elephant in the room, rarely acknowledged for fear of the backlash the truth of the scale of reduction required to save us will inevitably provoke.

 

Yeah, corporations and governments deserve the wagging fingers, though really this shit's on us. For many of us the only genuine power we have is how we spend our money, a power we rarely use to positive effect...and yeah, I'm guilty too...few aren't. Millions in the moneyed classes wring their hands and pontificate, although are unwilling to give up their luxury, the happiest cohort to embrace the fallacy of green tech salvation, happy to pay a little extra to show their virtue and assuage their guilt whilst continuing their consumption unabated. Even the Millennials and GenZs who champion the environmental cause so passionately and vociferously are voracious consumers of tainted goods, who'll be loathed, if honest, to relinquish their destructive 24/7 lifestyles; limited ethical/sustainable consumption is at odds with 24/7 unlimited labelled consumption. And of course, then there's the lived experience of millions of poor Britain's which renders proposed climate mitigations and associated costs at best inaccessible and at worst disenfranchising, the ethics of consumption merely another luxury they can't afford. I'll be honest I couldn't support any climate measures which exacerbate widening inequality, we can either move forward together or we can 'all' go down together. Is that wrong? Meh.

 

What I'm trying ham-fistedly to say is that there's no fucking honesty in any of our political or environmental dialogues, and without honesty around the genuine scale and scope of the radical societal change required, and the social consequences involved to halt the climate catastrophe (and societal collapse), partnered with a compelling and unifying combination of authentic messaging and policy......it's all just 'blah, blah, blah'.

Gigless

After spending time with family and friends, what I've missed most over the last 18 months of covid weirdness is going out to gigs. I love live music, always have from my first gig at Bournemouth's Stateside, the Two Tone Tour in 1979 (The Specials, The Selecter, Madness). There's something about being in those communal spaces, being moved by the performances, experiencing the event in a very personal individual way, yet being connected to the others in the room and making it a shared experience too. I love that energy, it feeds something in me...maybe I'm a Colin Robinson? I think though like walking the wild places or sitting around a fire, a good gig resonates with something deep within us, triggering ancestral memory maybe...communal events with music go as far back as we do. I was watching a Cary Grace Band gig from 2018 at the King Arthur, it reminded me of the joy afforded by quality live music. What a top gig. That's what I miss bands like the Cary Grace Band giving stellar performances in intimate venues like the King Arthur. You can't beat that shit. On the 'Arthur'; discovering the King Arthur was like finding a rare treasure, a warm and welcoming establishment with a constant stream of quality performers plying their art, we've enjoyed so many fine evening there. I can't wait to attend to live performances again. As it happens it was a Cary gig that was my last gig before covid, also in Glastonbury, though this time at the larger Assembly rooms...another stellar gig (where's that post?).

Spy Holms

Wow! A sight I don't remember seeing before, well, at least, nowhere, nowhere near to this extent. All the open grass areas of Spy Holms were completely swathed in a glistening, gently rippling sea of gossamer this afternoon. Quite the magical sight. Why? How? For that matter, how many bloody spiders did it take?

Amethyst deceiver

The floor of Burley Old is carpeted in Amethyst Deceivers (Laccaria amethystina), an interesting little edible, not particularly flavoursome though a fun addition to a soup or such if you want to cause a raised eyebrow in those not in the know...little purple mushrooms, not what you expect in your dinner. A word of caution though, although edible and non toxic in themselves, some sources suggest that if there's arsenic in the soil, Deceivers can build up high concentrations of it. So, maybe best avoided...unless you've a soil testing kit to hand.

Samhain

 

With last harvest safely gathered in, the year comes to close and the season of Samhain begins with a three day festival remembering those who've passed beyond the veil, feasting and metaphorically cleaning house...letting go. A carved pumpkin in my window acts as a beacon to those who may wish to visit from beyond...they are always welcome. I remember them, dear family members and fiends, those whose memories I endeavour to keep alive through the regular retelling of stories...mostly humorous, though some recounting wisdoms, others warnings. As I close my eyes and focus on each of them, their faces appear, always with beaming smiles, which in turn make me smile. This is one of my favourite festivals of the eightfold year. Samhain blessings y'all.   

Storm damage

Last night's fierce winds have wreaked havoc through the stands of Burley Old. This morning the woodland floor is strewn with canopy detritus, with broken leafy tips, splinter ended branches, fallen boughs, and sadly some much larger casualties too. High winds and clothed canopies are a recipe for disaster, one that's increasingly on the menu.

Utter dickery

The utter dickery of folk never ceases to astound me! Some plum (or plums) has built a fire against one of the Sanctuary's trees...what a remarkable lack of cognition. Fortuitously, by luck rather than judgement, not too much damage has been done to the poor tree. Where did we go so wrong that we forgot how to use the fundamental tools which were foundational in the human journey? Of course, it may have been they just didn't give a toss, wilful ignorance is certainly in vogue. Though I like to believe it's more a naïvety, for which I blame a lack of socialization to bushcraft or survival skills, due to our belief in the infallibility of modernity and our dominion over nature...silly monkeys. You know, we could have those believes seriously tested if we carry on our current trajectory. How many people know how to build and feed a fire, the different tinders or methods of igniting them or the properties of individual woods in relation to fire...or anything else for that matter. That's just the tip of an enormous lost essential knowledge iceberg too. How to read landscapes and skies, navigation, flora and fauna, medicinal plants, hunting and foraging, acquiring water, building shelter, and so much more all gone from our collective consciousness. We've lost all the basic survival skills which for thousands of years were innate to our ancestors. Is it any surprise we're lost too, so disconnected from the world that sustains us.

The Sanctuary

I was chatting to the guy, Steve, who created and maintains/extends what I've previously called Burley Old Clearing, and I asked him what he calls his creation, he replied...The Sanctuary.  So, the Sanctuary it is. More apt than the 'clearing' anyway.

Weird weather

I started our walk this morning layered up, braced against a sharp wind which raked the holms, though by the time we'd reached Red Rise (a mile into our walk) I was down to a t shirt...and comfortable with it. Often I'll take time in Burley Old and spend 20 minutes or so practising with my staff (come on now!), today the stands of were unnaturally warm, so much so that after this morning's session I was actually sweating. That's not the norm for the end of the second trimester of autumn. Nice as these unseasonable days may feel, throughout this year, weather wise, it's become increasingly difficult at times to be certain of what month or season you're in...and that ain't right. 

Fallow doe

A curled up fallow doe, it's a deceptive photo. In truth the Deer's badly injured, most likely the victim of a vehicle on the A31...only a few hundred meters away. Injured animals are sadly an all too familiar sight on or near the forest roads, scores of animals (ponies, cows, pigs, donkeys, deer) are either killed or injured on the forest's roads every year. It's a very sad state of affairs, that never appears to improve. I had no idea how long it had laid injured, there was little we could do other than phone the forestry, give a description and grid reference; they said they'd pass on the information to the agisters and asked if we could wait for 5/10 minutes just in case the agister needed to speak to me. We waited, standing a ways back, out of sight line of the deer. Several of the ponies grazing around us, moved in to investigate, closer and closer, their noses probing...until the deer raised it's head they jumped back. Weirdly they stared at Geoff and I, as if accusingly. I told them it wasn't us, though I imagine the homo sapien/canine combo comes with uncomfortable connotations to most animals. Half an hour passed and no call from the agister. By now the doe was still, her only movements were shallow breaths, she wouldn't suffer much longer. I decided to move on, there was nothing more to do, and I didn't want our presence in any way to add to her suffering. I petitioned the goddess to grant the doe a swift passage to the summer lands to join the herds of her forebears, and sombrely disappeared into the nearby stands.

Soarley Bottom

 Soarley Bottom*

 *You can get a cream for that. 

Ac-Cep-table

I've found it a slow season for mushrooms, an unusual year for fungi all round, the mushrooms have been doing weird stuff...appearing when they shouldn't and not when they should. It's still unusually dry out there now, and the temprature's all over the place. You have seasons that are better than others, some worse and others non starters. So in recent years, until I've got a handle on how the seasons shaping up, I tend to dry all the Ceps I collect. I feel you get better bang for your buck, so to speak, by drying them and using them crushed up through the winter in soup, stew etc. Top flavouring, and it's a better use of the resource too. Over the last couple of weeks I've collected a few Ceps here and a few there, and now have an ac-cep-table dried store to carry me through.

Red Rise risen

After last night's rain Red Rise Brook was for the most part impassable this morning, it's environs an extension of the stream itself. It's sooo wellie weather. I wonder how long it'll last though? The ground is still so dry that despite temporary puddling in places, and the water quickly drains off the surrounding landscape, whisked away in no time. That'll all change when the forest softens up, it'll hold onto the water much longer then, making certain routes problematic for lengthy periods.

Full Moon

 

I've been marking the full Moon with a fire for decades. Occasionally the weather tries to thwart my plans, in which case I cut my coat according to my cloth. Tonight was one of those nights. The weather wizards had predicted sustained rain, and as the sun sank so the clouds rolled in and the air told you rain was approaching and the wizards were right. So tonight I marked the full Moon with a small fire in my Ghillie base. It was lovely out. Half an hour passed and I stopped feeding the fire, as the flames died so the rain began to fall, and it wasn't long before it was lashing down. Perfect timing.

Bushy Bratley

Bushy Bratley

Mind food

 The recent rain and cooler nights have brought out the mind fruit.

 

Sound of autumn

 The sounds of Red Rise Brook on an autumn morning.

The long house

The Long House in Burly Old.

Minotaur beetle

A male Minotaur beetle (Typhaeus typhoeus), cool spot.

Art for art's sake pt2

 

As promised part 2 of the wonderful new pieces of graffiti on the circular water reservoir atop St Catherine's Hill. The light was right this morning to capture the remaining pieces of art, and I think you'll agree, these are some fantastic works here. You know, I was talking to another dog walker, waxing lyrically about how cool it is to see colourful graffiti, how it brightens what are dull industrial buildings and should be encouraged, and celebrated, she said there'd been complaints about it! What? Why? What's wrong with folk?

Spy Holms barrow

There are four Bronze Age barrows (two loose pairs) on Spy Holms, roughly dating from around 2000 to 1500 BC, of which the barrow in the photo would've been the biggest. Although centuries of forestry have no doubt destroyed many, there are still 2000 or so Bronze Age barrows surviving on the New Forest's heaths.  We have the builders of these barrows, and their Neolithic forebears, to thank for the landscape we see today. It was they who originally cleared the land for farming, only to find the soils too poor to sustain agriculture, though perfect for the development of heathland. It's difficult to identify which type of barrow it originally was, thousands of years of the elements and wildlife have somewhat slighted what must have been a substantial and important burial mound, though I'd suggest it was a bowl barrow. 

 

 

Red Rise Furze Brake

As the year winds down so the colour slowly drains from the forest, verdance gives way to the subtler golden hues of Autumn. This is particularly evident as you take the path down Rock Hills with it's views over Red Rise Furze Brake.

 

Rutting time

Rutting continues in the forest and this year I'm seeing scrapes in parts of the forest I've not traditionally seen them. I don't know why that is. Maybe they're due to an increased number of competing stags this year? I considered whether it was a sign of a growing overall deer population, though quickly dismissed that as the current population is held at around 2000 (Fallow, Roe, Red, Sika and Muntjac) by regular culling. Then I thought, maybe it's a sign of displacement due to increased numbers of visitors the forest has seen over Covid. A couple of years ago I commented to a ranger that I felt I saw more deer these days than I remember back in the 90's, and she told me it was more a change in deer behaviour driven by the increase in visitors. That said, I've noticed a huge reduction in people out in the forest over the last few months, since 'freedom day', their effects may still be rippling through the forest though. Mind you we tend to keep away from the honey pots. 

Cep

A couple more every day.

 

Another late arrival

We saw our first Parasol mushrooms (Macrolepiota procera) this morning out amongst the heather of Spy Holms. Two nice fresh examples of a good size too. Another mushroom arriving outside of it's usual season, which for Parasols is June to September; I know it's not uncommon to see them in October, or them to still pop up, though it's not common for them to make their first appearance this late in the year.

Red Rise

You could tell we've had some rain, the floor of Red Rise bordering the stream is scoured clean, all the leaves and small twigs gone. Where the ground's so dry in no time the water would've raced off the land, quickly overwhelming the stream and swept through the stands. When this happens the waters scour a filigree of small channels through the woodland, over time these small channels can deepen and broaden into more significant seasonal watercourses. 

On point

 

It's 'supposedly' mushroom season though the forest is still too dry, that said I've had a couple or three a day for a couple of days now, so, slowly slowly catchee monkey and all that. It is slow going mind. Geoff's very patient, keeping watch as I potter, always on point.

Red Rise Brook

Red Rise Brook. 

Red Rise

 

Some of my favourite tracts of forest woodland are those unenclosed stands which border the enclosures or flank the forest's streams. Red Rise is one of those tracts. I like the enclosed mosaic plantations, and love the lapsed patterns of the older enclosures, though the organic nature of the unenclosed woodland calls me differently.  

Burley Old

 

Burley Old

Pale Tussock Caterpillar

Pale Tussock (Calliteara pudibunda) caterpillar.