Rites of Autumn

Sharp frost overnight – we’ve seen the odd spot of rime on other people's windscreens - but last night’s was the first this year to make patterns on the conservatory roof.  As we have had almost 24 hours without rain, it was time to have a try at cutting the grass.  The mower did its best to refuse to start – I guess its ignition system is as sensitive to the damp weather as my joints – but it did complete a cut, and in the process chopped up and boxed most of the ash and oak leaves that our  neighbours’ ugly trees shed on our land every year.  It’s a muddy, sweaty job, and the grass is a bit chewed up in places by the mower’s driven wheels.  But all in all it looks less worse nor what it used to was, and Her Majesty's compost bin is close to full.  Out the front there’s the occasional blade of grass from the seed sown on the bald patch left by the unlamented leylandii. 

As for the fauna, we took a walk into the village this morning for some veggies, returning via the pond to check on the ducks.  Arthur was there, together with two noisy and well-grown ducklings.  Of Doris, no sign – nursing her noise-induced headache somewhere, I guess.  Here in the garden there are occasional rush hours at the feeders, usually, and conveniently, when we’re having our breakfast as well.  After a long absence, several nuthatches have been visiting.  Previously we hadn’t seen more than one at a time.  A pair of goldfinches – quite a rarity in our garden – spent a while at the sunflower seeds the other day, and we have suddenly attracted the attention of at least three jays, who come and feed from the peanut tray five metres from my vantage point in the dining room.  This is the time of year, I read, when they’re usually banking thousands of acorns.  Good job, I say: I’m forever hauling oak seedlings out of the garden.  Perhaps the crop has been poor this year: they are cleaning us out of peanuts faster than the squirrels can get to them.  We have a lot of this year’s scruffy young wood pigeons at the feeders as well, and it’s amusing to observe the pecking order.  But they’re all down a step from the jays, who see them off summarily.  Groups of long-tailed tits sweep in and out now and then: we tend to see more of them when there’s snow on the ground.  The usual robins, dunnocks, blue, coal and great tits are regulars, but we never see a house sparrow, though they are plentiful just a few hundred metres away. 

Fireworks last night.  The village next door has a bonfire and firework display every year around this time: I guess the village, like Lagrasse, avoids holding its annual display on the same night as the bigger show up the road.  I could see it well from the conservatory, though Martyn insists he got a better view by hanging out the back bedroom window.

Off south on Tuesday for a week.  I do not pretend to look forward to the rush-hour drive to Stansted.  We may leave early and linger over a lengthy brunch at one of the hotels.