Trees

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Katharine
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Re: Trees

Post by Katharine »

Nanohedron wrote: Sun Mar 27, 2022 7:33 pm
Katharine wrote: Sun Mar 27, 2022 7:13 pm ... here we had snow yesterday and below-freezing temperatures today. These are the times when I start to think that maybe this year spring won't come...
Tell me about it. Of late it's unseasonably cold here, too - parka weather, really, and in late March, of all things - although the snow and ice have mostly melted due to a cruel warm snap that made us let our guard down. I've often said that our weather is best described as "wild mood swings", but while it still applies, it's way more challenging now than it used to be. I can no longer tell myself that maybe I'm just imagining it.
The difference I've noticed from the way "it used to be" is that winters are a lot milder. About which I'm not complaining. Driving home from work in a blizzard is a distant memory, but a distinct one from the first couple years I lived in this area.

I'm not sure if this is "unseasonable" cold right now, but I always get this way at this time of year, when we've had some nice days and I can almost taste the prospect of being able to be outside, to open my windows and let some fresh air in, of going out without bundling up like a penguin, and I get pretty impatient. And yeah, it seems pretty typical... it's getting warmer, but slowly... we have days when we backtrack and I despair... par for the course. But I don't have to like it just because it's "normal" and I'm used to it. Thailand with "I can go outside and do things every day of the year" was a beautiful time of my life.

We do have swings, though. Okay, here it's a joke that the weather swings from one day to the next and it's true, but that's just the way it is here, not climate change.
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Re: Trees

Post by GreenWood »

I'm more tuned to the weather in the south of Spain, though south Portugal is similar in many ways, just slightly more humid and windy. Normally October there are first small rains after the summer, and from November through April there are weather systems that make their way down from northern Europe. They last a week or two, with maybe two or three a year. There it gets "cold" , say down around 5 centigrade at night and 15 during the day, and later warms back up to over 10 at night and around 20 during the day. Rain can be at any time, sometimes there are endless weeks of rain in late autumn but sometimes almost none right through winter , and early spring there tends to be...but not always. I follow the reservoir levels, a few times in the last decades everything was at absolute minimums and saved by a wet year, but I remember water being switched on an hour a day in Spain, not so very long ago.

We used to live in Indonesia...and then one day found ourselves in London :-( . I don't mind ice and snow so much, or dry cold, but cold and wet and sunless I never enjoyed much, especially in a city. One side of the family are from Peak District, and there it occasionally snows "a lot".

In the middle-east it would reach around 50 centigrade, you would open a door and the heat and glare would knock you back. Plastic in cars would melt. Even in Spain inland, say Sevilla, it can go well above 40 degrees in summer, but the coast is cooler, and this part of Portugal cooler still.


Some photos from the south coast

Image
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Re: Trees

Post by GreenWood »

I thought as much for the photos Mr. Gumby ... when I first looked at them that is exactly what sprang to mind, that someone or other would take them and use them, and so I was a bit surprised that you shared them online. Our (family) media outlet (mentioned in another post) was in a middle-eastern country without copyright law (from before the gulf wars and on) ... so there was a competition between different outlets to get hold of the best pirate copy of say a new film, first. This was days of vhs and betamax, I remember receiving copies of films that had been filmed in the cinema, with people walking around in front of camera etc :-) . It was all friendly enough , you could go downtown to a music shop, give a worker a list of favourite songs, and they would record those to cassette in the act. When copyright was enacted eventually, corporate media moved in, megastores and so on... most of that eventually went to online... which is what has been sort of policed since. Personally, and I always do my best to respect other people's ownership of their work, I would rather there be no copyright law, only against fraud (pretending to be author of another's work for example) ...just because it is too much of an excuse for outside management of online content. If they want to prosecute someone filesharing for example , then they have to have access to private information online etc. Once that access is granted it can be misused. I was going to say there are acceptable ways to keep content clean (in all respects)... but then I look at what is presented online as mainstream and I just shake my head.

If you look at media, say news media, they have mostly all sold out, likely due to the change of income model, the reality of audience meaning revenue... instant catchy news instead of written to be printed next day. They spare the cost of journalism by all parroting the same news source, which is not good. That is just to say that no matter how protected their content is and how that should pay, it just ends up going down to clicks in the end. Most of the good sites I know rely on voluntary contributions as finance model. In short the internet is that way, if you place something on the web, half the world has access to it...if you display a picture you cannot charge after the fact, and you cannot stop someone "taking a photo" of that picture. They cannot figure a way around the new model where anyone can publish, compared to it being something slightly exclusive before with content only available after payment (for say a paper). That all feeds through to content providers also, music and photo for example... people will use whatever they find online, but attempts at paywalling quality tend to fail to one degree or another because there is so much alternative, and income competition to go with it. Publishers will pay still though, so I also understand why someone would want rights reserved, but even there it then becomes a walled garden "owned" by various interests, meaning they don't just control what is presented (for example careful promotion of a certain artist) but they also have the means to channel access of audience.


When I search up a paper (say academic), I scroll until I find a free version, and usually those versions are legitimately free access. What I notice though is that "illicit" free content sites are banned on search engine, though I imagine they must exist on the dark web or from countries without strict copyright law. It really underlines to me that what we see via the web is chosen for us. I have personally been shadow banned also ... which is a closer reminder.

So it's a strange new reality. I look at Kkrell's page and that reminds me how things used to be, very straightforward and deserving, where the effort of presentation is due its reward...but success nowadays is usually snapped up by competition, rights bought out by others and so on.

I'm sure some have a completely opposite view of it all, which obviously they are entitled to.

This takes me back to what music is, picturing before media to the time where there was only "live" music. In one post it was mentioned there was less, or little, talk about music... I don't know, I imagine there wasn't much talk before the web either, at least it would be at the pub, or between neighbours and so on. I think internet media raises people's expectations too high, because it is all instant and "perfected" with an air of being where it is all at... whereas before, music was mostly something for spare time for most people, for playing amongst friends and so on...which is closer to what it is about.

I also keep online presence as low as possible. One side of that is what is visible to others, the other side to it is the level of tracking that is possible and does go on. The tracking is supposed to be anonymous or "not noticeable", but I reject feeding any sort of information center with personal details of any kind beyond what is openly offered. Fortunately here in Portugal ID registry is not nescessary for mobile phone card /internet connections, but they are slowly moving that way with new obligatory access to telecom logs and so on. I watch that sort of information gathering creep, coming from Spain where it has become very centralised... and obvious. I have had conversations with intelligence officers (and even before that I was already approaching online with this attitude) who basically confirmed the level of access that is possible and routine when chosen . This was before Snowden even. The only sure approach is to consider anything on a computer connected to the internet as visible to others, including its camera and mic, but most people they really aren't that interesting for more capable access, mic recordings are just used to generate adds by computer, geolocation same, data harvesting is used to tailor products and target buyers and so on. I don't like the feeling of being part of that attention though.

Anyway, anything I put on line I count as "lost", and over time I think most people learn to tailor how they interact with online... I don't know though... I read how much TV people watch in the US say (and we don't have TV ) and I reckon if that extends to internet use then probably not.
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Re: Trees

Post by GreenWood »

I missed photographing the pear blossom. By the time I had returned with a camera most of it had fallen leaving the tree like this


Image

It reminds me of the morning I woke up and outside in the middle of the road, perfectly intact and empty, was a car on its roof. There was no-one was around, no traffic. I looked again a quarter of an hour later and it had gone.

That also reminds me of the wild boar we see sometimes. The other evening three were just trotting along the side of the road, trying to look inconspicuous, but usually they are only heard while out foraging. Except for the lone boars, great fierce shaggy beasts that always seem to be charging around to somewhere.

Anyway, this is a picture of a pear tree before blossoming :-( .

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To the side are fallen trees, and some of their wood is salvageable :-) .

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As none of these are that colourful, I will include some photos of orchids from here.

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Image

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Wild orchids.
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Mr.Gumby
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Re: Trees

Post by Mr.Gumby »

You're well ahead of us. One of our pear trees is in blossom, just, but the rest of the fruit trees aren't there yet. We went back to cooler weather and frosty nights. The daffodils are nearly all gone but the primroses and other stuff are bringing a bit of colour around the house. Wild garlic getting underway but orchids and all that are a few weeks away. Looking forward to the gentians.

We get this sort of orchids:

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Gentians:

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Pics taken some years ago.
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Re: Trees

Post by Mr.Gumby »

I was out walking in East Clare yesterday, weaving in and out of the East Clare Way around Flagmount, along The Shores of Lough Graney. It's an tree rich area with a lot of musical associations, Paddy Canny and P Joe Hayes were from around there, concertinaplayer John Naughton and there are loads of tunes bearing names of landmarks and townlands: the Lacaroe, Maghera and all of those.
There was a lot of old forestry being felled in the area, by the size of the stumps left behind plantations must have been there for over fifty years. But there were large areas with various native trees as well, notably a surprising amount of silver birch. Quite pleasant to be out there. Didn't get anything overly notable pic-wise. It was a bit of a grey day. A few miles over you are in the Slieve Aughties and well into the heart of East Galway. The huge windafarm of Derrybrien atop the Slieve Aughties was very much in view, its eighty or so turbines about to be decommissioned due to mismanagement that caused huge bog slides and devastation.

Trees in a (very black) river in Cahermurphy nature reserve:

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Flowers in the undergrowth:

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Murky view of Maghera across Lough Graney:

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Re: Trees

Post by Mr.Gumby »

This thread doesn't seem to have much life left but I'll have another go. Been out and about today.

Today I spent walking in Portumna forest park. A bit of entertainment for the easter monday. The forest park was left to the state very early on, the family who owned it had no heirs and the big house was burned in 1922. 1200 acres of old forest land, mixed trees, a lot of them of great age. A very large herd of fallow deer too, we were warned to stick to the trails as the place is bristling with ticks.

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At some point we reached a grove of beeches, very old trees, some recently fallen. The ladies of the big house apparently had their tea there so the trees must be well over a century old.

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Just beyond it there was another grove, the forest floor completely covered in bluebells and wild garlic, great smell off it when walking through. We were perhaps a week early bluebells only starting to bloom, a few of them anyway but not enough to hold their own in a picture. It surely will be spectacular when they are all going. There's a tune for them too, by Michael Dwyer : Bluebells are blooming.

Walked about ten, twelve miles or so and made it back to Portumna castle, having left early and without coffee a visit to the castle's tearooms was very much needed.

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The trip to Portumna took us right through the heart of East Galway, basically turning off the Gort to Loughrea road heading east through Derrybrien, Abbey, Ballinakill, Kylemore and places like that. Loads of associations with East Galway music there, Woodford, Kileenadeema and all those places.

Had a bit of a poke around in Ballinakill on the way back. Always loved the old Ballinakill band. I used to visit a fiddler/piper in East Clare during the eighties and nineties, Martin Rochford. Martin had great stories from when he used to travel up there to visit the Whytes and Moloneys during the 1940s. Ballinakill traditional players : Shaskeen/Green Blanket (=the Ewe)

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Outside the church in Ballinakil is a memorial to the band:

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Katharine
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Re: Trees

Post by Katharine »

The magnolia tree at my complex is blooming; I look forward to this every year because I love magnolias. We're about to have thunderstorms, though, which is going to completely destroy all the flowers, so I'm glad I got to have a good look at it in all its glory today.
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Re: Trees

Post by Nanohedron »

The greening is slow this year; it's been an unseasonably cold, wet April with only widely-spaced one-day teases of how nice it could be. Even the grass is hesitant, but then we're trying to bounce back from last year's drought which was a killer. So, if it means cold has to go with it, I'll take the rain, thank you.
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Re: Trees

Post by Mr.Gumby »

Katharine wrote: Sun Apr 24, 2022 5:09 pm The magnolia tree at my complex is blooming; I look forward to this every year because I love magnolias.
From 1979 to 1986/7 I lived in a city in a large house from the 1880s. There was an old magnolia tree tin the garden that was my pride and joy. I have no idea how long it had been there but it was an old tree , I don't think I have seen (m)any larger magnolia trees. It full bloom it was a magnificent sight.

That's long ago though and these days I find myself in a crumbling cottage in the West of Ireland. In front of the house is an old appletree, according to the neighbours it has been there forever (they grew up pinching apples from it). At some point it was cut but the stump re-grew five shoots that now form a considerable tree that dominates the front garden. It has created a shady spot, surrounded by hedges. I keep it clear of brambles and nettles as best I can but otherwise I maintain an approach of benign neglect to thar area. Over time bluebells have colonised the garden from the wild and right now they are coming into their own. These, for the botanically minded, are not Virginia bluebells but Hyacinthoides non-scripta, something entirely different. And sometimes there's the odd one that comes out in pink, these are rare though.

Image Image


In other news, the cuckoo has been calling on the mountain since last week and earlier today he approached the house for the first time. First swallow too today, only the one though.
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Katharine
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Re: Trees

Post by Katharine »

Nanohedron wrote: Sun Apr 24, 2022 5:45 pm The greening is slow this year; it's been an unseasonably cold, wet April with only widely-spaced one-day teases of how nice it could be. Even the grass is hesitant, but then we're trying to bounce back from last year's drought which was a killer. So, if it means cold has to go with it, I'll take the rain, thank you.
Yes, we have the same (minus the drought part). Like, Easter was beautiful, sunny, in the 60s... the day after we got like three inches of snow. Last week it was rainy, wet, in the 50s... this weekend it was 80 and sunny both days... this week we're back to temperatures in the 40s/50s and even below freezing at night. I hate it. I'm sick of being cold and it's time for warm weather to get here!

Mr.Gumby wrote: Tue Apr 26, 2022 12:41 pm
Katharine wrote: Sun Apr 24, 2022 5:09 pm The magnolia tree at my complex is blooming; I look forward to this every year because I love magnolias.
From 1979 to 1986/7 I lived in a city in a large house from the 1880s. There was an old magnolia tree tin the garden that was my pride and joy. I have no idea how long it had been there but it was an old tree , I don't think I have seen (m)any larger magnolia trees. It full bloom it was a magnificent sight.

That's long ago though and these days I find myself in a crumbling cottage in the West of Ireland. In front of the house is an old appletree, according to the neighbours it has been there forever (they grew up pinching apples from it). At some point it was cut but the stump re-grew five shoots that now form a considerable tree that dominates the front garden. It has created a shady spot, surrounded by hedges. I keep it clear of brambles and nettles as best I can but otherwise I maintain an approach of benign neglect to thar area. Over time bluebells have colonised the garden from the wild and right now they are coming into their own. These, for the botanically minded, are not Virginia bluebells but Hyacinthoides non-scripta, something entirely different. And sometimes there's the odd one that comes out in pink, these are rare though.

Image Image


In other news, the cuckoo has been calling on the mountain since last week and earlier today he approached the house for the first time. First swallow too today, only the one though.
It all sounds perfectly lovely!
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Re: Trees

Post by Mr.Gumby »

It all sounds perfectly lovely!
This time of year is always good. If we get it at all, this is the time we get the nicest weather of the year, loads of flowers, the cuckoo calling. Raises great hope for the summer to come and a break from the regular bleakness. The mood usually lasts only a few weeks. It's good while it lasts.
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Re: Trees

Post by Nanohedron »

Mr.Gumby wrote: Wed Apr 27, 2022 9:01 am... and a break from the regular bleakness.
What with all the storied Irish greenery, I find "regular bleakness" a curious choice of words.
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Re: Trees

Post by Katharine »

Mr.Gumby wrote: Wed Apr 27, 2022 9:01 am
It all sounds perfectly lovely!
This time of year is always good. If we get it at all, this is the time we get the nicest weather of the year, loads of flowers, the cuckoo calling. Raises great hope for the summer to come and a break from the regular bleakness. The mood usually lasts only a few weeks. It's good while it lasts.
Yes, I have to admit-- one thing about spring is going out regularly and seeing what is going on in the world of flowers now.

(However, it would be nice if it would get WARM. Also, I'd be able to stop feeling sorry for all the flowers that came out when we had a couple warm days and now are freezing their little stems off...)
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Re: Trees

Post by Mr.Gumby »

Image

:P
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