Waiting for the Light

Ann Mackay21 Comments
Frosted Caryopteris clandonensis seed heads

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During winter direct sunlight doesn’t penetrate along much of one side of the garden. Photographing plants in this area can be frustrating. Even if they have a good coating of frost, they don’t catch the sun to make that frost sparkle.

Taller plants, like those here, do get some sun for a very short while, so there may be just enough light to make photographing them worthwhile. The light changes very quickly at this time of year, so the opportunity doesn’t last long.

Frosted climbing hydrangea
A climbing hydrangea is just tall enough to catch the light.

Happily, January brings a gradual increase in how far the sun reaches over the garden fences and tall shrubs, over time illuminating more of the smaller plants. By the time spring is here, the sun will be high enough to allow me to take photographs throughout the whole garden. That is a time I look forward to!

Meanwhile, it occurs to me that I should plan to place the plants that look good when frosted in places where they will catch a little sparkle of sun. (But not somewhere too sunny, otherwise the frost may melt before I get outside with my camera.) I may be developing my own style of garden planning – ‘hortus photographicus’, hehe!

Frosted Daucus (wild carrot) seed head
A frosted Daucus (wild carrot) seed head lurks on the dark side of the garden.

Wishing You a ‘Guid New Year’

Ann Mackay19 Comments
Frosted bronze weigela leaves.

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A guid new year to ane an a
An mony may ye see,
An during a the years to come,
O happy may ye be.
An may ye ne’er hae cause to mourn,
To sigh or shed a tear;
To ane an a baith great an sma
A hearty guid New year.

A Guid New Year to Ane An A

As in the words of this traditional Scottish song, I wish everyone a ‘guid new year’. May it bring you all the best of health and happiness. (I think most of the meanings of the Scots words are fairly clear, but just in case they aren’t: guid = good, ane = one, a = all, mony = many, baith = both, sma = small)

I’d like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who reads my blog and to say how much I appreciate your comments and the chance to chat a little. I hope that my small patch of the internet brings you some pleasure in the natural world. Here’s to 2024! 🌿

Happy Christmas to You!

Ann Mackay26 Comments
frosted fennel

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I hope that this Christmas, whether you celebrate it or not, will bring you happiness and wellbeing. It has been a busy year for us, so a time of good cheer and a little bit of indulgence will be welcome. (We value quieter Christmases these days – they give a great feeling of peace and time to just relax.)

Despite my usual frosty photo for Christmas, it looks as if we’ll see no frost or snow over this year’s festive period. Christmas day is forecast to be sunny, so time outside in the garden is a possibility. But there will be no hoar-frost photos like this one taken last December…a rest for the camera maybe!

However you spend Christmas, I hope that it’s a good one. Merry Christmas! I wish you joy. 🎄

Frost and After

Ann Mackay11 Comments
frosted gaura flower

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Last year’s hoar frost made icy little sculptures out of many of my garden plants. The one you see here is Gaura lindheimeri. (Now known as Oenothera lindheimeri, but I still call it by it’s old name. There are too many plant name-changes to keep up with these days!) This plant carries on flowering until late in the year, so frequently ends up covered in frost.

The area where the gaura is growing stays in the shade for much of the day in winter, so the frost lasts here for a long time. That gives me plenty of opportunities for taking photographs, but means that the sun doesn’t reach the frost to make it sparkle. So photography here is a bit of a compromise. Perhaps I should consider the effect of sun on frost when planting!

Eventually the frost will go, changing the look of the flower again. This time the petals are likely to be left translucent and looking very fragile indeed. (They usually wilt quickly after being frosted.) The drops of melted frost give an interesting texture to the flower – you can see right through the petals to the drops that are actually on the other side. ❄

Gaura with melted frost drops

From Very Little…

Ann Mackay18 Comments
Frosted Pulsatilla Leaves

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Frost has an amazing ability to enhance the smallest of garden details. It takes very little to allow it to create a fleeting beauty. Anything can suddenly become attractive when encrusted by these tiny, white crystals of ice.

The last of the year’s flowers, dried-out seed heads, leaves, or slender grasses stilled by the cold air – all are made much more interesting to look at by a touch of frost. These are the leaves of Pulsatilla vulgaris (pasqueflower). In spring they are soft and hairy and a delight to stroke. By winter those hairs have disappeared, giving the curving shapes of the deeply-cut leaves more prominence. To my mind, the dead and frosted leaves suggest the look of a woodcut image or engraved stone.

As I’m writing this, the ground is still frozen. Tomorrow, though, is forecast to be milder and rainy, so the magic of the frost will be gone from the garden. These leaves won’t last long once the frost has finished with them, but will be left limp and probably rather translucent. The frost will have helped them along their path of decomposition and their eventual contribution to the richness of the garden soil. 🍂

Frosted Pulsatilla Leaves
Frosted Pulsatilla Leaves

Here Comes Winter

Ann Mackay27 Comments

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Winter is fast approaching us, with some heavy frosts already here. But it hasn’t arrived quickly enough for frost to catch the leaves of this elder (Sambucus ‘Black Lace’) this year. The leaves stayed on the shrub unusually late last year – right into December – and gave me the chance of this photograph during a hoar frost.

Hoar frost itself is unusual here. This was the first time I’d seen it in my garden and I made the most of my chance to take some photos of it. (Got a bit frozen though!) This year I’ll be on the lookout for it happening again.

I’d have been happier if this year’s frosts had held off for a little while because I still have a lot of work to catch up with in the garden. Weeks of rain have meant that the ground was much too wet for planting and needed a chance to dry out. Now the ground has dried out and I have plants I want to move. There are others in pots that are waiting to be planted out. But the ground is frozen! I will just have to wait a little longer. Right now, it seems like a very good idea to stay indoors and warm, perhaps just venturing out for a few more frosty photos… 🙂

Frosted leaves of Elder

Another (Almost) Silent Sunday

Ann Mackay14 Comments

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It’s a re-post of an image from near the start of my blog (in 2018) for this week. We’re just getting back to normal here after having our new heating system installed and it’s good to be warm again. With a bit of luck I’ll be back to my garden and photography in the next few days. 🙂

(Almost) Silent Sunday: Cosmos

Ann Mackay16 Comments
Flower of Cosmos 'Seashells'

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It’s a post-and-run this week because we’re getting ready for work to start tomorrow to install our new heating system. There’s a slight feeling of chaos around here right now – hopefully it will be replaced by a good feeling of warmth soon! 🙂 (And the flower is Cosmos ‘Seashells’.)

Tranquillity Remembered: Wild Carrot in Autumn

Ann Mackay12 Comments
Daucus carota (wild carrot) in evening light in autumn

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Here’s a quick look back to wild carrot (Daucus carota) seed heads in early autumn, photographed in the light of a sunny evening.

Evening is a time I love in the garden, especially early on, while the sun is still out. It’s quiet and peaceful once the traffic of workers going home has gone, with just the occasional sounds made by a foraging bird. The light makes everything look better at this time of day.

Now the evenings are darker and those seed heads are gone. But there will be more new wild carrot plants in spring and sunny evenings will return. For now though, I’m very busy with preparations for a new central heating system being installed, so I haven’t had much time for the garden or photography. Our home has been in a state of disruption and reorganisation while we moved things around to allow the work to be done. Hopefully, all will be settled again soon and we will be warm this winter!

Fruitful Times

Ann Mackay16 Comments
Braeburn apples on the tree

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There are hardly any flowers left in the garden now, so almost everything is in shades of green, with a few leaves turning yellow here and there. (There are still the purple leaves of the smoke bush in the front garden. With a bit of luck, these will turn some interesting shades of yellow and orange – if they don’t get blown off first!)

During the last week, I’ve seen a bit of colour from fruits and berries in the garden. We finished picking the fruit from our apple trees a couple of days ago…you can see the last of the fruit on our Braeburn tree above. Our other apple tree is a Cox’s Orange Pippin which had already had its fruit picked a little while ago, so the Braeburn’s apples give later colour.

Near the apples we have a holly bush. I was considering cutting it back a lot this year because it has grown somewhat tall and spindly. I’m glad I didn’t do it, because this year there are more berries on it than I’ve seen before. This means a feast for the blackbirds!

The blackbirds (which are my favourite garden bird – alongside the robin) must do quite well here. We have two grapevines, one of which is huge and shades an arbour. The blackbirds seem to be constantly in and out of this when there are ripening grapes. We only eat a few of the grapes ourselves (they don’t get very sweet), so we don’t begrudge them to the birds. There are plenty of other berries, including the orange-red berries of our rowan tree and, later on, the ivy berries. It’s just as well that we have these to distract the birds, because blackbirds are partial to apples too… 🙂

Holly berries
The holly has more berries than usual this year.