Across the British Isles the wet weather dominated the month, plenty of familiar forecasts with ‘wet and windy’ days and ‘prolonged spells of rain’ but down on the Lizard we also had enough sun and warmth to dry several days of washing. Covid is still a heavy presence and continues to shape our lives but the land and the wildlife follow their own path and get on with the job in hand. The birds still sing, the owl still hoots at night, the moon continues to wax and wane, trees lose their leaves while young daffodils and snowdrops push up through the earth.
In the field the prickles are growing well, enormous fat beasts, at times stretching to two foot in diameter. The dandelion is also sporting new sets of juicy leaves and the sorrel continues to produce copious amounts of new leaves. Frozen yellow corn cockles and dark mulberry red dogwood, alongside the mauve flower of the spear thistle and a solitary rose all add their colour to the winter scene. The spear thistle belongs to that amorphous group known as ‘weeds’, often considered a pest by gardeners. However, its seeds are used by birds, the flowers are a nectar source for butterflies and are also pollinated by bees and other insects. In addition to this they are edible for humans. In Portugal during springtime, they are sold in bunches at the markets. In a study published in 2010, ‘Ethnobotany in the New Europe’ the research showed that the thistle contained higher levels of major nutrients than the vegetables we usually consume. The nutrients included fibre, protein, phosphorous, magnesium, calcium, copper, zinc and others. Not bad for a pest.
The daffodils adorn the fields around us. The relative warmth of the Lizard encourages these hardy bulbs to push through the soil before Christmas. By late December the pickers are already needed in the fields. They arrive in the early light and can be seen working the rows all day until dusk, the weather is often unforgiving and harsh. The British don’t want this work and it is mostly carried out by seasonal workers from overseas.
The skies were busy this month. There was the ‘great conjunction’ around the 16th day, a time when the planets Jupiter and Saturn came closer together than they have been since the middle ages. Here in the southwest we were able to witness this event in the sky about half an hour after sunset on more than one evening. For whatever reason, it was exciting to see this through the binoculars. The winter solstice followed on the 21st, a damp and cloudy day with the sun rising at 8.17am and giving us 8 hours and 1 minute of daylight. There were the annual meteor showers and finally the full moon on the 30th. Known as the ‘Cold Moon’ from the native American societies who used the moon to mark seasonal changes. Other names were ‘Drift Clearing Moon’, ‘Hoar Frost Moon’ and ‘Long Night Moon’, giving a pretty clear idea of the weather conditions they were facing. New Year’s Eve looked set to be a replay of the solstice, grey and rainy but in the late evening the clouds rolled away, the moon shone and shooting stars skated across the sky. A hard frost settled on the ground, looking like giant snowflakes had frozen across the land. It made a delicious crunch when you walked across the grass. It felt like a good night to welcome in the new year.
Kommentare