September’s Song!
I am writing this whilst sitting by my pond enjoying the early September sun and being harassed by the most enormous but beautiful green and blue dragonfly. He keeps flying up to me as if to look me in the eye, but can I get a photo of him, can I heck as like! Not a chance! I can hear his wings whirr as he skims past my right ear. He’s quite a distraction; anyway back to the subject in hand, this bountiful season.
September is one of those funny months, it still feels like summer but there are tell tale signs that Autumn is just around the corner.
You can’t beat a bit of Keats to capture the essence of this time of year; this is the first verse from his ‘Ode to Autumn’.
Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness! Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless with fruit the vines that round the thatch-eaves run;
To bend with apples the mossed cottage-trees, and fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells with a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees, until they think warm days will never cease,
For Summer has o’erbrimmed their clammy cells.
I ought to stop here really as I’m not going to be able to top that!
As each season progresses towards the next there are subtle changes in the air, the sounds, the colours and even the smells are different and distinct.
The Sights…
Harvest time creates what is probably the most dramatic visual change in the living landscape. From the brown fields of late autumn and early winter last year, into the gradual greening of the countryside in spring and the golden landscape of the summer. Then the harvest! Suddenly the gold is gone; all that remains are fields of stubble running with hares and festooned with huge round or square bales. All too soon these too are gone and the soil returns to brown to start the process over.
This is a time of plenty both in the garden and wider landscape. The bold colours of late summer, the reds, oranges and yellows and even greens and purples of ripening fruits will soon give way to the blazing leaf tints of autumn. Then into winter with the brilliant stems of Cornus and Salix and the contrast of stark branches against pale skies and frosty fields.
In the wilder landscape the bright orange berries of the Arum itlicum (Lords and Ladies) adorn the bottom of ditches and the Rowan are so laden they look as though their bows will break. There is a promise of more to come as the blackberries start to ripen together with the rose hips and Hawthorne berries.
Butterflies flit and chase each other along the ditches and verges feeding on the last of the thistle and knapweed flowers before they go to seed. Rose bay willow herb, Bindweed and Ragwort are all still being utilised by insects.
The caterpillars of butterflies and moths are starting to pupate and can be found hanging under shelves in sheds and greenhouses.
Squirrels venture away from their normal haunts in the trees to be seen on the ground burying their horde away from their companions.
The Sounds…
There’s a constant hum in the countryside at this time of year with combines, tractors and grain dryers. Although farm machinery can be heard throughout the year, the intensity rises at harvest time. Nature waits for no man and the harvest must be gathered whilst at its peak and before the weather breaks.
There is also a constant hum in the garden but this is due to the flies and wasps feasting on my ripening fruit and the bees still busy on the late summer flowers.
In the same way that swallows are the harbingers of summer, so they also indicate its end when they gather to leave for warmer climes. The Robin starts to sing again and is now a constant companion, singing his distinctive song from a nearby bough and awaiting an opportune meal turned up by the gardener.
The verges are alive with the sound of crickets which spring up before you as you walk through the grass.
The Smells…
There’s a freshness in the air in the mornings, and a smell of dry straw later in the day rising from the dust produced by the combine.
Fruit as is ripens fills the air with a sweetness that one doesn’t get at other times of year. There is also the inevitable ‘smell of the country’ as muck spreading takes place.
I don’t see the impending season as a time of death and dying as some do, it’s merely a time of resting, taking stock, drawing breath and gentle regeneration after a busy year of growing.
As autumn approaches and all the land has given up its bounty, growth goes on, admittedly at a much quieter and more sedate pace.
In the garden or on the farm, harvesting isn’t the end of it, more of a beginning, clearing the ground for the next round of growing.
