January bridleways

[puddleshark]

A bright cold morning, the fields silvered with frost, and the paths an entertaining mix of ice and mud.



Set off early from Corfe Castle, taking the path that runs westward along the foot of the Purbeck Hills.


The first stretch of the path passes through a narrow tunnel of Ivy and Old Man's Beard, with Blackbirds chinking and Great-tits scolding.


A Sika stag crossing the path.


Further along the hill, the way opens out. Not as many birds here, unfortunately, as the farmer here has trimmed his hedges, leaving no berries for the birds to feed on. I don't know why so many farmers have this obsession with neat hedges.


Walked as far as the old lime kiln. The stonework near-lost beneath ivy, and at this time of year the ivy covered in ripening berries. Inside the kiln, it's very damp, and water drips steadily from the vaulted ceiling. But it's pleasant to sit in the arched window, to rest a while in the sunshine. And in winter you're not disturbing the Wrens who nest in crannies in the stonework.

Seen, but not photographed: on the hillside above the lime kiln, a couple of Redwings high in the branches of a tree, probably waiting for me to leave the lime kiln so they could resume feeding on the ivy berries. Such beautiful birds!


Redwing (image courtesy of Steve Garvie from Dunfermline, Fife, Scotland, & Wikimedia Commons).



Hazy views across the valley. Smoke rising from chimneys.


Ice or mud. Why settle for one, when you can have both?


The bridleway to Bucknowle shining silver in the sunshine. It's one of those paths with ambitions to become a stream in winter.




Frozen tractor ruts and flowing water, but it's fine if you stay in the middle of the track.

Crossing the lane at Bucknowle was a little chancy, the tarmac covered in sheet ice, but once I was back in the fields again, the going wasn't bad at all. One or two sheltered places were a little soggy, but mostly the ground was frozen hard, the grass crunching under foot.


Fell in with a family of Long-tailed Tits, and we made our way back along the hedge towards Corfe, them mostly dangling upside-down from twigs, and me preferring to remain right-way-up, admiring the way the low winter sun burnished their pretty blush-pink plumage. The old country name for Long-tailed Tits was 'Bumbarrels', for their barrel-shaped nests.

The fieldfares chatter in the whistling thorn
And for the haw round fields and closen rove,
And coy bumbarrels, twenty in a drove,
Flit down the hedgerows in the frozen plain
And hang on little twigs and start again.

'Emmonsails' Heath in Winter' - John Clare

Contrails above Rookery Wood.




Over the packhorse bridge. There's a steep clay slope to climb on the other side of the bridge before you can reach Corfe village, and sometimes in winter it's a scramble. But today it was frozen hard, an easy climb.