Harrowing: Three Visits

 I've come to understand there are ups and downs when observing the natural world.  So today I take with me a different mindset: curiosity without judgement -- a hard balance to strike.

The weather's cooler, and windy which I know will add an extra challenge to my list of jobs.  The first thing I notice is compressed long grass and weeds and poppies; a tractor has been in the field again.  Following the tracks up the tiny rise I see that the field has been harrowed.  The ground is churned up and turned over, and lying scattered on the surface a what looks like dry stalks.  The contrast between prolific growth on the field margins and the plot in the middle could not be greater.  I wonder what will be planted there.

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I carry out my list of jobs: observations first, as usual, the folding and scrumpling of two metres of paper strips prepared at home, and then sketches of various wildflowers and grasses using walnut ink.

All through this time I'm noticing a range of bees, butterflies and other insects; the fact that convolvulus, sandwort and  hairy tare are twisting their ways round the other plants, slowly choking them while the poppies bravely continue flowering.  The hedgerow plants stretch out their arms towards the sun, but there's no bird song today. 

Another week and it's now July, a day of sunshine and shadows, a breeze moving the grass and rain threatening.  The full hedgerow has seed heads: dog rose hips and haws, hard and green.  Plants everywhere continue to grow energetically:docks in majestically tall clumps, Queen Anne's lace higher still and the spikiness of dandelion and thistle leaves is more pronounced: the green of everything is  deepening.  These observations are a sharp contrast with the harrowed area which is delineated and waiting.  

Since talking to Sian I've bought a lovely rolled up sketchpad; the papers are made of rag. Today I plan another walking record and to do some sketching.

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I've used charcoal, which I love on the rough paper and will spray later.  These drawings, I feel, are much freer, less self-conscious.

Another visit, it's now the second week in July, the day's warm, heavy with the threat of rain though it comes to nothing.  Underfoot the ground is wet, moisture clinging to every surface, the product of great downpours over the last week.  I'm lucky it's not raining now, though my feet and trousers are quickly dampened.

On the field are more new tractor markings, not only crisscrossing, but round the perimeter.  Green growth has begun to sprout, grass maybe but I don't think any thing has been planted.

In the field margins the grasses continue to rampage, some bent over with the weight of moisture.  In the odd place clumps of grass are pressed down, maybe by animals.  There's a noise in the hedge bottom but nothing emerges.  Hidden too are the moles that have left these fresh brown heaps, a trail of dots across the field.  And all the while bees and small flies and butterflies flit from flower to flower and doves coo.

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What next?

 After my last shocking visit to my field I've been rather reluctant to resume going there.  This turned out to be a pity.

It's a lovely morning, and I'm driving along earlier than I usually do: this is my tenth visit and three weeks since my last one.  With all the usual paraphernalia and my little beach chair I push a pathway through to my usual spot.  The grass is lush and tall; when I sit down it's almost as if there is a bank on which the grass is growing.  It's so tall it masks the rest of the field, and when I sit down it's taller than me.  There is something very lovely about this green enclosed world.  It's beautifully warm, there's a blue sky with soft clouds and birdsong.

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My main priority today is to add drawings to my walking record.  I don't take the camera: the plan is to focus on this task and then if I want to take photographs to do that as a separate thing.  There are really lovely things to notice: at least nine different grass forms, red and white campions and poppies amongst the grass, dog roses in the hedge, their thick lower trunks a series of bold parallel lines with huge pairs of  thorns.  Bird song's in the air the whole time.  I'm marking this in a machine stitched rhythmic mark, my steps in the spring of linen thread.  My mind is working on a number of levels digesting what I see and thinking about translating sound and movement into stitch.

The grass and flowers have gradually reduced in height as I walk along.  Looking up my emotions are caught out in the same way as when I saw the hare last time, for the whole is now a prairie: brown and parched with occasional faded yellow rape plants.  No longer fresh green capped with a haze of yellow,  only frowsy seedheads clinging to blackened plants.  When did this happen?  How did it happen? Two tractor lines intersect at some point, possibly a clue.  How I wish I had kept to my routine.  A single skylark swoops into the field from the oak tree disappearing into a scruffy brown clump.  Is there still a nest? And how could the lush growth where I was sitting still be looking as it does?

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