Category: Habitats

Snow Showers

snow sketch

weatherwatch reportCoxley Valley, 10 a.m., 30ºF, -2ºC: I cross the beck which is brown with melt water to draw on a flat area that, thirty years ago, was a meadow. Since then alders and crack willows have spread from the side of the beck. wild garlicAt this time of year the leaves of wild garlic are starting to show amongst them but today a centimetre of snow covers the ground.  Wet snow patters on my fishing umbrella as I draw ivy and bramble on a fallen willow.

It’s so long since I drew in the snow (as opposed to drawing it as seen through our patio windows) that I record the scene in a photograph and submit it to the BBC Weather Watchers website.

snow on log

wren fernA wren flits across the puddly path as I leave the wood and hops under a bramble; a robin sings despite the snow shower. song thrushThe song thrush by the path at the edge of the beck isn’t singing but I have heard it at the edge of the wood when I’ve been drawing in the back garden.

Link: BBC Weather Watchers

Mossy Rocks

mossy rocksI can find a quality of wilderness in moss-covered rubble, flooded fields and tumbling willows, so I didn’t have far to go to find a subject this morning. These chunks of sandstone form a wall around the raised bed behind the pond. We used the soil that we excavated from the pond to make the raised bed.

It’s a still, sunny morning with a clear blue sky but although the temperature has risen to 50ºF, 10ºC, there’s still thin ice along one side of the pond.

There’s a jingly song from the next garden which I take to be a dunnock:

‘pwik – kiwik – pwik – chEE’

dunnockMy bird book (Alan J Richards, British Birds, A Field Guide) describes the song as ‘a not unmusical jingle of notes, shorter in duration and less powerful than the Wren’s’. The wren belts out its song so emphatically that you know it means business.

Green Fire

hawthorn leaves‘Time still weaves its web. Cold winds blow across the country – but blue sky, the occasional sight of flowers are the essence of future hope. Soon the green fire will be bursting from all the hedgerows . . . and the stagnant pools will become animated with life . . .’

William Baines
William Baines

The letters and diaries of William Baines (1899-1922) reveal the way the composer drew his inspiration from the Yorkshire landscape. His impressionistic piano pieces conjure up pictures of coast, woodland and moor.

The Yorkshire of William Baines, my final project for a Diploma in Art & Design course at Leeds coincided with the 50th anniversary of his death. I started by talking to his surviving friends and relatives and went on to produce a publication, two concerts and an exhibition that at the Harrogate Festival in 1972. As a result of all this work, Roger Carpenter invited me to provide the illustrations for his biography of Baines, Goodnight to Flamborough.

Periwinkle climbing through the hedge.
Periwinkle climbing through the hedge.

I’m reminded of that ‘green fire’ quote when the hawthorn leaves start to appear in the wintry hedges. This winter was the warmest on record for central England, and records begin in 1659 so, uniquely as far as I remember, we’ve had a few green leaves in the hedge throughout the winter.

Link: William Baines, composer and pianist 

Tête-a-Tête

daffodils3.15 p.m., 43ºF, 5ºc: As I draw these small tête-a-tête daffodils a dunnock hops about unconcernedly beneath the bird feeders just ten feet from me.

blue titI’m pleased to see that the blue tit with the drooping wing can now fly. It’s spending less time on the ground and more time on the feeders.

catdunnockIt’s as well that it can fly. The large fluffy black and white cat that lords it over all the other cats on our street is on our front lawn, very interested in something but I can’t see what but at least there are no feathers lying around it.

Molehill

molehillrobin3 p.m., 42ºF, 7ºC: This molehill appeared a week or two ago exactly in the middle of our back lawn. We could see it growing, like a mini-volcano erupting, but we were never able to spot the creature making it. A robin eyed the growing pile and flew over to perch and peck on it.

As it was directly under the fat ball feeder which hangs from the washing line we did at first consider that it might be a brown rat digging a bolt hole as close as possible to a source of food but no exit holes ever appeared so this is a subterranean creature; it must be a mole. At the moment there are plenty of molehills just like this on grass verges and alongside the woodland path.

moleI’ll rake out the soil and spread some grass seed over it. The tunnel will help improve drainage beneath what becomes a mossy lawn over the winter and the excavations will help recycle nutrients in the lower layers of the soil.

The Old Town Hall

clock
The Town Hall really does have a Toy Town look to it; that double chimney looks as if it could have been constructed from Victorian wooden building bricks.

Wetherby Town Hall is like the town hall you’d find in an old fashioned children’s story or a Wallace & Gromit adventure but, despite the doll’s house simplicity of its facade, I always find it difficult to get just the right angle when I’m drawing the pediment.

As it’s such a symmetrical building, drawing the facade is like drawing a portrait and small changes in an angle can change the expression on its ‘face’.

facadeIt’s a problem that I don’t mind coming back to. I drew the window during our coffee break – which included a wholemeal scone and honey – at Filmore & Union on the way to Knaresborough yesterday and the pediment after a walk by the River Wharfe at brunch today – when I opted for the healthy pancakes with coconut milk, seasonal fruit, maple syrup and Greek yoghurt.

Urban sketching can be so tough.

Link: Filmore & Union

Wallace & Gromit

Ash by the Beck

ash by the beck

blackbird3 p.m., 38ºF, 4ºC: This old ash tree grows by a gravelly section of Coxley Beck.  It would be more usual to find a willow or an alder growing with its roots in the water but the stream may have changed course since this ash sprouted from an ash key, probably getting on for a hundred years ago.

wrenA blackbird forages under hollies on the bank behind me; a wren investigates the undergrowth alongside the path; long-tailed tits and blue tits check out the tree canopy; and wood pigeons coo monotonously in the tree tops.

dunnockIt’s a good time of year to start trying to learn bird songs and one that I always struggle with is the dunnock. It doesn’t belt out its song like the wren and it’s not as clear and wistful as the robin; it just hurries through a short jingle. I try to remember the song by sketching it as a series of notes.

My impression of the song of the dunnock.
Sketchy impression of the song of a dunnock.

‘a not unmusical hurried jingle of notes, shorter in duration and less powerful than the Wren’s.’

Alan J Richards, British Birds, A Field Guide

In the Complete Birds of Britain and Europe, Rob Hume describes the song as ‘quick, slightly flat, high-pitched, fast warble with little contrast or variation in pitch.’ That verdict sounds like a lukewarm put-down from one of the judges on a television talent contest.

Link: Sketch Bird Songs, a field session with John Muir Laws in the Sierra Nevadas

Dog’s Mercury

dog's mercuryStoneycliffe Wood, Yorkshire Wildlife Trust nature reserve, 3.30 p.m., 39ºF, 4ºC: The only flowers showing on the woodland floor so far are the spikes of male flowers on dog’s mercury. The inconspicuous female flowers are on separate plants. Dog’s mercury is a member of the spurge family.

first celandineIn south-facing hedge-banks, lesser celandine is already in flower but here in the wood so far there are only a few heart-shaped leaves.

The larger leaves in the bottom right corner of my drawing are ground elder. Ground elder was introduced to this country by the Romans who cooked the leaves like spinach. While the right-hand leaf of the ground elder has been well nibbled there is very little sign of damage to the leaves of the dog’s mercury which, like the spurge, is poisonous.

pigeonThe stem of the bush in the top right corner of my drawing is elder, another plant with similar looking leaves. Glossy bluebell leaves are springing up but wood anemone and wood sorrel have yet to appear.

robinA robin is singing, a wood pigeon calling and pheasants are grockling.

Cardiac Hill

‘Did I hear the man on the phone describe this hill as Cardiac Hill’, I ask three passing dog walkers.

‘No I’ve never heard that one!’

‘It would be a good name’, I suggest, ‘the way it gets steeper and steeper as you get towards the top.’

jack russel‘I always come down it!’

‘Very wise!’

Ash Stump

ash wall

I return to finish my drawing of the old ash stump. It is growing on a south-facing bank that is supported by a drystone wall. The small rabbit is back, same time, same place: on the grassy slope next to the tree.

rabbitYesterday I also made a note of magpie, wood pigeon and of two long-tailed tits investigating the branches of the adjacent hawthorn and sycamore. A robin was flitting about and perching on a parking sign.

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Categorized as Trees Tagged

Drawing in Gloves

silk glove

ash in pen

2.25 p.m., 43ºF, 8ºC, still and sunny: I spotted this ash stump growing on an old stone embankment wall when we visited the Go Outdoors store, Middlestown, yesterday. I’d gone looking for grippy gloves because the welt on the fingerless mittens that I’ve been using gets uncomfortable if you’re drawing for a while. My knuckles have been getting red and raw, drawing when it’s close to freezing.

I found the various gloves with gripper pads a bit cumbersome but we spotted some in pure silk which aren’t the warmest available as they’re mainly intended as lining gloves but they’re better than having exposed fingers. It’s easy to grip pen, water-brush and paintbox.

I found myself rushing to complete my drawing of Caphouse Beck yesterday so, today, when I sketch the rabbit which suddenly runs up the grassy bank and check my watch to record the time, I decide that I should allow myself more time so I’ll return tomorrow to finish off and add colour.ash sketch

mitten

Mitten (acrylic)

glove

Trekmates silk glove

rabbit

Links

Go Outdoors

Trekmates silk lining gloves