shadow of a bird in the garden

Light in the Garden – Sunday 4th January, 2025

Our garden depends on light for growth, for it to be seen at all, and for its colours. We are now converting sunlight energy into electricity with our solar panels. Light is either particles (photons) or a wave. Which is confusing as how can anything take two forms? But this is the realm of the sub atomic and they do …

Our Advent Calendar – 24th December, 2024

On Christmas Eve, we had the celebration of the area’s Advent Street Calendar. Date numbers went up in house windows, one house at a time, from the 1 December to the 25 December (with one exception) in the streets participating: Earlham Grove, Clova Road, and Sprowston Road. The garden was 24, the only one not a house. 21was due to …

image of an old clock outdoors

What’s the Time? 14th December, 2024

In 1840, Great Western Railways set a standard time on its lines. Over the next seven or so years, this was taken up by other railway companies. London time was used, which was the time at the Greenwich Observatory, already called Greenwich Mean Time. Initially GMT had to be carried by an operative with a clock going on a train. He would stop off at the various stations to correct their clocks. By 1855, the telegraph put him out a job. 

There was resistance to London Time. Town Hall clocks and station clocks in some areas gave different times with up to 20 minutes variation. Though, by 1858, 98% of towns had adopted London Time. The final step, which went beyond the railways, was the Definition of Time Act of 1880 which set one time for the whole country.

diagram of the difference between coppicing and pollarding

Coppicing – Sunday 1st December, 2024

It is the first day of meteorological winter. This system simply splits the year into four seasons, each with three calendar months, and so winter runs from 1 December until 28 February, with 1 March being the first day of spring. It sort of works, depending on the year. The leaves are gone from the deciduous trees and we have …

fallen Leaves

Storm Bert and Climate Change-Sunday 24th Nov, 2024

I am writing this mid afternoon as the high winds are beginning to ease. A little while ago we had sunshine and blue skies but the wind is still strong enough to change the weather every ten minutes, blow it in and blow it out again. When I left the house, I was instantly struck by how warm it was. …

image of people decorating jars for candles in the garden

Hygge – Saturday 9th Nov, 2024

Today we are welcoming winter, and have adopted the Danish word ‘hygge’ for the event. It means cosy, comfortable, warm, perhaps with cake and coffee. I have looked up the pronunciation, and without getting into phonetics, the closest I can get is that it rhymes with cougar, the mountain lion, which is definitely not a hygge (hougar) creature, should one …

an image of the witch's walk group led by Derek Smith on Saturday 27th october

Witch’s Walk – Saturday 27th Oct,2024

On Sunday, I led the walk to the Witch’s Tree. You never know in advance how many are going to come to such events. My daughter guessed seven, I was more optimistic and reckoned there’d be ten of us. We were both wildly out as 34 showed up, half of them children. The walk started from the garden at 1.10 …

image of a beetle called a Rose Chafer

Rose Chafer – Friday 18th Oct, 2024

I have been reading Insect Crisis by Oliver Milman. It’s quite a tough read as there are so many insect species, and we are mostly given species names such as Coccinella septempunctata (the seven-spotted ladybird). Having got this far, and needing to check the zoological name for ladybird, I got waylaid by this site: It begins: The name “ladybird” originated …

an image of the base of the witches tree located in Bush Wood

Witch’s Tree – Sunday 22nd Sept, 2024

This week, I have been on search for the Witch’s Tree in Bush Wood, woodland at the northern end of Wanstead Flats. I tried to find it nine months ago for my latest crime novel. I couldn’t find it and decided that one of the characters couldn’t find it either. Well, he does in the end and is found murdered under the canopy.

An image of the pond in the garden

Full Pond – Sunday 29th Sept, 2024

Warm air holds more moisture. But you may have noted, I said it is chilly. Well, moisture in the air is picked up over the sea, mostly the Atlantic and that retains its summer warmth well into late autumn. Warm air also has more energy, which gives us fierce winds and storms. Around the country there has been some very wet weather, with extensive flooding in places like Looe in Cornwall: