autumn is on the way

yesterday morning i got up to see the roof of my car covered in dew which means the night before was very cool. this only happens when autumn is on the way

No signs of autumn here in weather... Our weeping birch has started to turn yellow and has dropped some leaves.. Rowans are full of berries and are all red, it has been a very good rowan year ;) Also saw a robin in our garden 2 days ago :D

Yes, the rowans are wonderful here this year too Evert, and even better in Northern Ireland!

Robins aren't so common here than Britain and Ireland I think.. I haven't seen them many times in our garden. :}

They nest in mine and are here all year. In fact they had at least two broods here, possibly three this year :)

Our robins move to Britain and central europe for winter and only have one brood here I think.

:( I like them, they're feisty little birds.

Rowans are getting redder by the day now. the branches are bending with the weight.

this is supposed to be a sign of a very hard winter but it actually shows we had a very mild spring with no blossom damaged by frosts.

I also think an early autumn is upon us - the fruit trees in several fields have reddening leaves and when I was walking up the mountains last weekend, there was lots of erica and lots of seeded yellow gentians - lots of alpine flowers too but getting a bit tatty and tired looking, especially the leaf area. We're having warm days but it gets quite cool at night now - and the mosquitos are with us en masse, again (late summer/autumn). The green in the trees on the opposite moutain side is looking dark and tired.

Come back summer, all is forgiven!!!! :-}

Gerddi - yellow gentians? =) Are they wild?

Yes, Evert, they're wild. Gentiana lutea grows between 1000 and 2500 metres above sea level and is 40 to 150 cm tall. It's a protected plant - in the past many were dug up for their (medicinal) roots. The ones we saw last Sunday were at 1800 metres and were about 80 cm tall and had definitely finished flowering. Normally they flower June to August so have possibly finished a bit early. I didn't see any in flower.

I think they're great plants, and they're so tall too. I haven't seen them for sale here, only one growing in HiBo.

Still late summer here.

6 am still has a haze although I have espied a couple of deep fogs at 4 am coming up from Southamton Water. Doesn't mean anything in itself (generally gets foggy any time of day or year here) it did remind me of the deep mists across the fields during October ... not nearly so cold though.

My birds have stripped my Rowan tree of the berries, and i do feed them as well, thought they only eat them in the winter when food was hard to get. Yes it is getting chilly here at night in NW England, mind you its easier to sleep when cool though. Never mind of to Spain for a very hot holiday, well it had better be.

Sheila

I'm off to the UK for a holiday (Wales, then Shropshire then North Yorkshire - Upper Wharfedale). Not expecting a lot of heat though! Should I bring my winter woolies?

A jacket will be an essential i think gerddi! Though you'll need to bring a Tshirt as well - you know the good old British weather, lol.
What a lovely trip - some of my favourite places!!

The conkers are ripening now. I made a comment about this on another website - and there were comments "What are conkers?" Apparently conkers are a British pastime - Americans don't seem to have heard of them. My Dad used to help me collect conkers - he used to throw twigs up into the trees to knock down the conkers for me. It's quite a sentimental memory for me.
I like autumn. Spring is my favourite season but autumn isn't far behind. Summer always seems a disappointment. Roll on autumn!

Lovely to see you Northerner. How are things, and did you have a good birthday?
My favourite season has always been autumn, but now i'm swaying towards spring and the promise it holds

What are conkers?

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Oh, I found it... http://web.ukonline.co.uk/conker/archive/conkers.htm

We call those hevoskastanja. :}

This message was edited Monday, Aug 26th 2:36 PM

Things are tough for me at the moment Philomel. Problems at uni caused by my glaucoma. I have an appeal going through uni at the moment. Don't know yet what the decision will be. It's dragging on a very long time. Lovely to talk to you again. Thank you for the birthday wishes.

Northerner

We had conker fights/champions and so did our kids in North Yorkshire but I don't see them happening here in Switzerland, although they have horse chestnuts. A lot of the trees here are sweet chestnuts, so they eat the "conkers" instead! Are conker fights purely British?

I agree with you about the seasons - spring and autumn. I love autumn colours and the smell of what, my DH insists, are dying leaves! Then in winter I look forward to spring and get such a thrill when I see the first buds breaking and swallows returning. Summer alway comes in here too hot and then it's changeable, cool then warm, wet then dry for days; it's a battle against pests. Winter here is so long, very cold and then not so cold and just a waiting period - so I fill it with weaving, garden planning and sowing really early seeds indoors.

BTW although they have been in the Yorkshire Dales for years, DH's family originated in Middlesborough.

Hello Gerddi! I think conkers are a purely British game. Though the game is known in other parts of the world where Britsh people have emigrated, e.g. New Zealand and Canada. I assume the game won't last very long if the climate isn't suitable for horse-chestnuts.
Today is hot. The last of summer I'd say. I wish I could play hookey and paddle at the sea-side instead of being stuck at my computer. Sigh. Some days I think of Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn and just don't want to work.

Hello Northerner

Are you in the North Riding yet or is it still North Yokshire?

I know the feeling. As a translator I spend a lot of time at the computer trying to concentrate on work when my mind is on my garden, a walk in the mountains, a cup of tea in the sunshine on the balcony or, like now, my holidays.

My biologist daughter read somewhere that humans are prone to laziness - go hunting, berry gathering for food and then sit around the rest of the time. That's the life!

Hello Gerddi!
Midlesbrough has had a complicated history with boundary changes. It used to be in Yorkshire (and I still think of it as being in Yorkshire), in the North Riding.
Then in the 60s the politicians changed it into a new place called Teesside. And then in the 70s they moved it into Cleveland. I think there has been another change since then.
It still has the postal code of TS* ***, which is the Teesside code. But goodness knows where it belongs to now. Dratted policians.
Anyway, my parents were Scots, and I was actually born in Lancashire. So I'm not Yorkshire born and bred anyway. I find the easiest thing to say - is simply that I'm a Northerner!!!!

LOL Northerner, that sounds like the safest bet.
I think i'm even more confused. I was born in Chester (loved it) Dad from South Wales, Mum from London. When i was 5 we moved down to London and then into Kent.
So i've links N, S, E & W............

I ahve a friend who's an the board or whatever they call it of Middlesborough football club. There's a useless bit of information LOL

:)

I have Welsh, Irish and English (with some Scottish in there) blood and I was always told the family came from Wales, although I grew up in Yorkshire. I've married a man who is a quarter Scottish so we tell our kids they're British. We came to Swtzerland in 1986 and, although my DH and I want to come home, the two youngest see this as home so we will be adding Swiss in there as well. Their children will be European. Our other daughter considers herself a Yorkshire woman but was born in Kingston upon Thames (then Surrey) and will never forgive us for that oversight. She lives in Wales with a Welshman who grew up in Cornwall.

Gone are the days when we all stayed in one place!!!!!

I'm more amazed by people who do stay in one place - they are the exception. I often wonder if there is anyone who could legitimately claim to be 100% English! Northerner and the North Yorkshire bit of me could be Viking :-)

I consider Middlesborough to be in Yorkshire! My in-laws would be horrified to learn otherwise.

Yes, I'd consider Middlesbrough to be in Yorkshire too. I can see hills when I walk only 5 minutes down the road - the North York Moors. And the River Tees is also close here - that's Yorkshire too. I'm used to thinking of it as being in Yorkshire. Durham is across the other side of the River Tees. Not too far away from me, only a few miles, but definitely another county!