A splash of colour

-- on a grey morning.

It had been raining when we set off for our usual early Thursday morning walk but the sky was interesting and showed a bit of promise.

Heading up the incline through the woods of the St Ives Estate (a path that gets the blood pumping and warms you up on a cool morning!) I could see a splash of colour on Lady Blantyre's statue at the side of the path. At first I thought someone had put a posy of flowers in her lap but as we got closer it was clear that it was a bright yellow lichen. Poor Lady B is looking a lot worse for wear. Over the last couple of,years her crinolined skirt has almost rotted away. I didn't notice until I looked at the photograph that someone has in fact put a ribbon around her hat!

The second picture shows the sky as we crossed the field back down to the golf club. It just shows that a grey sky can still be interesting. Sadly it's promise came to nothing and it was raining by the time we got home. At the foot of the picture you can see some of the dogs having a great time as they always do in this field. One of them is a young boxer who decided to join in and was loathe to return to her owner!

Badger update: we had three in the garden last night. We cheated a bit by putting out some peanuts in a spot that was easier for me to photograph. The buff coloured one was there for quite some time before it was joined by two larger and darker ones. My neighbour and I were speculating as to whether the lighter coloured ones were young ones. Also the one I saw last night was carrying its' right back leg causing it to limp whereas the lighter one on the previous night was definitely using both back legs. This would make up the four, two young and two older ones, maybe?)