Hello, thank you for reading, I hope you’ve had some of the dry calm weather I’ve had here on the south coast of the UK. It’s made getting outside a lot easier. I’ve not been doing so well health-wise this week so my nature therapy moments have been much needed. It’s also the reason this is coming to you on Monday, if I’d sent it over the weekend, it might not have made much sense!
Noticing
Oh my, there have been so many beautiful nature moments this week. Either this newsletter is going to very very long, or I’m going to have to censor myself (ed. I censored myself).
Firstly, some green space therapy. I knew they were out there, tales of spottings were starting to drift in. I just had to find them myself. However the first spotting wasn’t very fulfilling for some reason. All through the walk, my eyes were peeled (when I wasn’t navigating not ending up on my bottom in the mud), searching for a glimpse of white. Yes, I’m talking about snowdrops, I don’t think I’m alone in snowdrops bringing so much joy and hope? So, we were nearly back at the car and under the trees by the side of the track, there they were, sparkling white heads dancing on tall stems. I seemed to be the only one interested, crouching down to photograph them as others walked straight past. Why did I feel dissatisfied? Maybe it was because, although all snowdrops are non-native naturalised plants (brought here in the 15th century and since spread across the country), it is the small dainty versions that bring me joy, rather than these tall strong ones.
So, the next day, with the sun out (this week’s main nature joy!) I set off for the cemetery. Despite its principal use, this place is a nature haven, for plants and animals and a bit of a cheat as I know there are snowdrops. I’m sure it will continue to feature here as soon there will be primroses and later butterflies and it’s less than 5mins walk from my house. The expectation of joy bubbled up as soon as I stepped inside the gate. Just as I passed under the cherry trees that will soon festoon the earth and sky with pink confetti, I spotted them. The first clump was peeking out from the knarled roots of a tree. Their buds still mostly closed apart from one whose gently flaring petals revealed bright green landing strip to beckon in insects.
Once I finally looked up from this clump, I realised they were not alone, the next tree was surrounded! Most still had their buds tightly held up like stalagmites, with others just beginning to consider opening. One cluster looks like an unruly pile of legs and arms, with their stems and heads entwined.
I think this is the earliest I’ve seen them, maybe it’s that this year I’m dedicating more time to nature moments, knowing how they enhance my day. I hope you spot some soon too.
A low tide, calm sea and blue skies day meant I could get some much needed blue space therapy. While green spaces bring me huge doses of goodness, it is blue spaces such as the sea where I feel even calmer and this is backed up by research (which I’ll talk about more in a separate post soon). Low tide means exposed sand for Bridget dog to run around on and rockpool treasure hunting for me. The chalk reef has hidden pools and deep valleys for creatures to hide in, but my eye is always drawn to the seaweeds, whether high and dry on the top of the chalk, or floating in the pools. It’s not just the shapes of seaweed that inspire me, but the positions it takes are always the best to translate into art rather than anything I could come up with.
But, the best bit of this week required my best noticing superpowers. I’ve always enjoyed seeing catkins (which are the male flower part on trees such as hazel, willow and alder), especially as there are one of the earliest signs of spring, sometimes appearing in December. But it was only last spring that I learnt about the female flowers. Two days ago, a social media post prompted me and this morning, I set off into my parent’s garden with a mission. I initially got distracted by Jack Frost’s beautiful patterns but they were soon forgotten, because, there right at eye level on the Hazel tree, glinting in the sun were the most exquisite tiny wonders I’ve seen.
Simple, vivid pink petals only a few millimetres long stick out from unobtrusive buds at the top of the catkin. So little in nature has colour this vivid this early. They are just sat quietly waiting for the big showy males below to do their thing. I only found two this time, but given the copious amounts of hazelnuts the squirrels ate last autumn, there must be more to come.
Creating
My creating has been rather limited this week due to a flare-up of symptoms, even playing with paint was too much for my brain. But, I did have my mini sketchbook with me on the trip to snowdrops. So I added to the joy with a quick sketch. Drawing them means I noticed the details even more, like the way the green part of the bud wraps around the petals while they are still closed and upright. Looking closely meant I captured the way the flower head hangs because I understood how the petals fitted together. It gave me a few calm moments to appreciate them, rather than getting stressed that my phone camera wasn’t good enough. While green sketching isn’t about improving my art but the joy it brings in the moment, my art skills have benefitted from it and it’s the foundation of what I do, even if my finished pieces are more abstract. And while I’m sharing the doodle with you, one of the tenets of green sketching is that you don’t have to share, you don’t need put that pressure on yourself. I also drew a tree that caught my eye, but that’s just for me.
Hopefully, there will be more studio-based creating next week, even if just from the sofa.
Reading, and watching
As I’ve been tucked up in bed for a lot of this week, there hasn’t been much reading but I have finished The Orchid Hunter by Leif and I will definitely be searching out more orchids this summer.
So my main recommendation to you this week is a watch. My tv watching is mostly anything to do with nature/wildlife and gardening. It always gently calms and entertains me, just as the real thing does. One of the reasons I find winter hard is the lack of my Friday night dose of Gardener’s World. But this week one of my seasonal highlights has been on - Winterwatch. By the time you read this, you’ll have missed the first week, but there’s always iplayer and hopefully, I can encourage you to watch next week’s programmes (BBC2 8pm Tuesday-Friday).
The reason I love all the Watches (Spring/Autumn and Winter) is really summed up in this quote;
“It is a piece of weakness and folly merely to value things because of their distance from the place where we are born, thus men have travelled far enough in the search of foreign plants and animals and yet continue strangers to those produced in their own natural climate”
Martin Martin, A Late Voyage to St Kilda, 1698 (quoted in The Orchid Hunter, Leif Bersweden, 2017)
Yes, it is old-fashioned and slightly pompous language, but note that date. Its meaning is unfortunately still true. We have always prized and marvelled more at that which is rare and far away, yet there are treasures to be found on our doorsteps. I want us to rediscover the amazing plants, animals and landscapes in this country, many of which unfortunately are just as threatened as those in the Amazon. So yes, the amazing David Attenborough type programmes from around the globe are wonderful, but I think we need more programmes exploring and celebrating the amazing wildlife and landscapes on these small isles. I want us to connect with what is here; the flowers on road vedges, the bees, hoverflies and insects visiting our gardens and the birds flying above our heads. This is why programmes such as Winterwatch are so important. I don’t want to sound preachy so I’ll step off my soapbox now.
This week on Winterwatch they have shown the wonder and awe of watching Rooks roosting in the fog, the antics of beavers on a river feeding platform and the healing power of wildlife watching in the mountains (which brought me to tears as I don’t know when I’ll be able to do it again myself). There have been urban foxes, otters, a rather stationary barn owl and some up close investigations of earthworms and centipedes. On Friday’s programme, there was a segment where Megan McCubbin swam under the Starling Murmurations at Brighton Pier. Doing this, even just watching from the Pier or beach has to be one of the most awe-inspiring experiences you can have and I highly recommend seeking them out if you have a murmuration site near you. Do you like programmes like this? I know the presenters can grate on some people, but I think it shows that nature doesn’t have to be serious and highbrow.
So, that’s all I can fit in this week, I hope I’ve inspired you, to notice more, to take a photo of something that brought you awe and maybe even encouraged you to write some lines about it or draw a doodle. Spring is most definitely showing us it’s waiting in the wings so get out and find it, I hope it brings a lift to your day. If you’ve enjoyed this, please do subscribe, it’s free if you want, or there is a paid option if you’d like to support what I am doing. I’ve ideas for additional posts, including ways to help people out into nature and start their own create with nature practice. And do pass it on to anyone you think might enjoy it too, it really does help.