The Brightest Star of the Evening

Continuing the catch up with more on an astronomical theme – this one is from 05 December 2013.

In my previous entry I wrote about the wonders of sunsets and seeing Venus shine in the evening sky, at that stage I thought that was the best that Venus could get. A bright star within a darkening sky, but how mistaken was I?! A few days after this, Venus began to coincide with the rising of the moon and on this evening, with a sky that was clear apart from a few light smudges of remaining cloud that caught and reflected the dying oranges of the sunset, the moon and Venus were the brightest objects in the sky. Standing bright and clear, dominating the evening sky long before any of the other stars could be seen.

The Dying Rays of the Sun – 05 December 2013 (Copyright Carol Jones)

It was sometime later that I discovered that on the nights of the 05 and 06 December that I was seeing Venus at its brightest for this apparition. In fact at this point in time it was the third brightest object in the sky, after the sun and moon. Certainly on this evening the moon and Venus dominated the twilight skies, leading the way towards night.

The Moon and Venus – 05 December 2013 (Copyright Carol Jones)

Star of the Evening

Continuing the catch up with another astronomical themed blog – this one from 28 November 2013.

So far I’ve been writing about the morning skies in November, but they weren’t the only things that have been bright and amazing. The evening skies have also had there moments, less so on the grand scale of colour and dramatics but still something to behold.

Over the evenings towards the end of November, the sky has had its moments, while the sun had been setting the sky has been lit by a single bright star, visible long before any of the other stars are visible. Though really this sighting is not actually a star, but the planet Venus, which shone like a bright pin-prick of light, highlighting the darkening skies of night.

Star of the Evening – 28 November 2013 (Copyright Carol Jones)

On this evening, Venus shone out from a darkening sky that had been coloured with a rich warming glow of the setting sun. The last rays of the evening sun made the clouds present seem almost black and whereas the surrounding sky was alight with fiery oranges. As the sun sank lower, the remaining rays of light painted the base of the clouds with rich warm oranges, warmer and darker than those of the morning. Then out from this darkening sky, like a single headlight shining out of the darkness to light the way towards the night, shines the Star of the Evening.

Venus – 28 November 2013 (Copyright Carol Jones)

Pillars in the Sky

Continuing on the theme of sunrises – this is one of the most special I have seen yet and dates from the 25 November 2013.

Most of the sunrises I see are sheets of colour painted across the sky in a grand scale, using large brushes and vibrant colours, but this one was something different. This one was far more delicate beginning with a pale orange watercolour wash across the horizon. As the sun rose the orange wash spread out across the still night darkened sky, like the slow but inevitable movement of the tide up a beach. Out of this advancing colour, just as the sun broke the horizon, there was what could only be described as someone turning on a powerful arc light that was pointed straight up into the sky, producing a distinct pillar of glowing light. Wow! There was something amazing about it, it looked so much like an actual arc light, but the size and the quality of light just wasn’t right and meant that it could not be man made, it had to be natural. At the same time the new sunlight also highlighted some thin wisps of clouds that wafted across the morning sky, in particular catching the remnants of several aircraft vapour trails and making them shine almost like silver.

Sun Pillar – 25 November 2013 (Copyright Carol Jones)

Later investigation showed that this arc light was the rare phenomenon called a sun pillar. Sun pillars are the combined reflection of sunlight from millions of horizontal ice crystals in the atmosphere and these collective glints form what seems to be a pillar of light.

Flaming Skies

Time seems to have flown and blogs seem to have been thin on the ground. Recently been looking back at some notes and found this which covers the sightings from a number of mornings through November 2013.

November is usually remembered as being a dark and dank month but not last year, in 2013 November was a month of blue skies and bright sunshine, accompanying such wonderful days there were a number of wonderful sunrises. One of the good things about sunrises in November is that they occur at sensible times of the day and can be easily observed without very early rises.

The sunrises of note during November were variations on a theme of fiery reds. It was as though the skies were temporarily painted from a pallet dominated by oranges and reds, ranging from the palest which could almost have been a figment of the imagination through to the rich and vibrant, colour that hit you directly in the face and took no prisoners. The description that follows is just one sunrise that occurred on the 13 November 2013, but all the colourful ones from this period of time, though each original would follow this common theme of reds and oranges.

Flaming Scarlet Skies – 13 November 2013 (Copyright Carol Jones)

As the new light of day, pushed over the surrounding hills and began to burn the dark of night away, the sky began to lighten and colour beginning gently with the palest shades of orange, tingeing the edges of the few clouds available. As time moved on the oranges become brighter and warmer producing a mass of colour, all in varying shades of orange and all wonderfully warm. No time to linger and contemplate for the scene did not stand still, it continued to develop with every passing second. Soon the oranges began to brighten again, as though the sky had caught fire and the heavens had begun to glow, like the coals in the grate of our fire. Throughout this phase of the sunrise the oranges continued to brighten, becoming redder and more much more scarlet in nature. At the height of the display the sky took on a burning scarlet, rich and vibrant in nature, and almost radiating heat on what was a cold and chilly morning. However, this vibrancy and warmth did not last long and soon burnt out, so that the sky passed rapidly from flaming scarlet to a cooler cherry red, which soon began to fade to leave just the odd remnant of colour to tinge the edge of the morning clouds.

Fading Glories – 13 November 2013 (Copyright Carol Jones)

November’s wonderful sunrises were not as common as to occur every day or even necessarily every few days, but they were common enough to be remembered for their amazing displays of colours. Its strange, as many times as I see these amazing morning displays, each is unique and original, and with each I have that feeling of wonder that there may still be a bright, fresh new world out there waiting to be discovered.

 

Greens that Shine into Autumn

Continuing into autumn with a blog dating from a visit taken on the 06 October 2013.

Took a walk up a small hill (or maybe hillock is a better term) called Muirhouselaw, at the start of October, a hill which is found to the south east of the Eildons and from where they stand out like pimples in the flat surrounds. On this day, which was one of those dull autumn days when the sky was grey, the clouds seem to sit as though they had been loaded with lead. The clouds were not so low as to hide the hill tops, but low enough so as to sit like a distinctive layer in the sky, grey and heavy with much promise of more to come.

The Eildons – 06 October 2013 (Copyright Carol Jones)

Currently the surroundings where set against this dull grey but this brought the greens into full focus, it made them bright especially the improved grassland just in front of where we were standing, which seemed to glow in the gloom. Below even the old greens of the wooded strips that disappear towards the Eildons looked bright and were highlighted by the occasional patch of autumnal gold that was just beginning to appear in the odd tree here and there. Then between the strips of green even the brown of the freshly ploughed fields have begun to shoot away to produce a new sheen of fresh new green.

Peniel Heugh – 06 October 2013 (Copyright Carol Jones)

Spider’s Jewels

Heading from summer to autumn, this is the first blog from the autumn and dates from 28 September 2013.

After a long hot summer I knew that autumn had finally arrived when the morning’s dew remained captured on the delicate filaments of the Spider webs well into the following morning, rather than disappearing at first light. Overnight the Spiders had been working hard in our hedge, to make the top surface a bejewelled carpet of webs, scattered like a fine gossamer blanket that had been snagged by the upright shoots of the hedge when blown in the wind.

Spider Webs – 28 September 2013 (Copyright Carol Jones)

In the morning sunlight the fine threads were covered with an amazing array of tiny droplets of dew, it was as though someone had been out all night threading tiny iridescent beads onto the threads. In the morning sunshine each of these beads then reflected the sunlight in all directions, producing an array of tiny rainbows. A temporary but very beautiful effect that didn’t last long, for even this late in the year the morning dew does not last forever and the strength of the autumn sun soon evaporated them.

A Spider’s Web Covered in Iridescent Beads – 28 September 2013 (Copyright Carol Jones)

In the Sky with Diamonds

What a wonderful cold clear night, the skies are clear and the stars twinkle like jewels in the darkness. Temperatures have been below freezing for most of the day and everything is crisp and frozen, crunching gently under foot as you walk by.

The coldness of the day has allowed frost to coat every blade of grass with tiny ice crystals. They almost form symmetrically neat lines, down the edges of the individual blades and along the veins, but every so often one or two will be out of place to destroy this pattern. Even so they enlarge and magnify the blades, making each blade easily identifiable, amongst what had become a wet and compressed mass of grass over the course of a very wet summer.

Diamonds in the Grass – 11 December 2012 (Copyright Ross Lockley)

Amongst this mass of tiny crystals there seems to be an occasional jewel. Every so often as the torch light passes across the ground, one will catch the light and shine like a diamond in the darkness. Its almost as though some one had put their hand in a bag and thrown jewels round the garden, scattering them across both grass and hedge alike. Millions of tiny treasures waiting just to be taken, but also as ephemeral as a sparkle in the eye. Gone as soon as the light moved on.

The Eye in the Snow

First sprinkling of snow for this winter (though in fact we have yet to reach winter and are still in autumn) occurred on Friday night, maybe an appropriate way to welcome December in. To be honest, it wasn’t what I would necessarily call real snow. More like a layer of tiny ice crystals that gave a thin white crystalline coating to the already frozen ground. Each ice crystal was still quite visible, looking as though there had been a leak in a bag of rice, as each crystal was about the size of a grain of rice and each was individually identifiable.

Ice Eye in the Green of Winter – 01 December 2012 (Copyright Carol Jones)

The cold though, has made the temporary duck pond into a shining frozen eye, and with the sun low in the sky the whole affair shines and twinkles like a watery eye. This eye is then ringed by the hazy bright white band of ice crystals, made even brighter by being in a field of green, where the rest of the snow has been melted by the days bright sunshine. This eye sat there almost unblinking in the bright light, but not quite, for the warmth of even the weak winter sun, makes the ice expand and contract. This expansion and contraction produces a wonderful pinging sound, almost like the stretching of an elastic band to its final limits. The expansion was so great that the elastic pinged, and broke, as it breaks the note produced almost reaches the high notes of heaven.

Nature in Unexpected Places

Tuesday evening, means that its shopping evening. Ho hum, wasn’t expecting to see much wildlife round Tesco’s on a dark, damp November evening, so I was somewhat surprised to find a cheeky Robin, staring me in the face and chirping somewhat manically while I was wandering down the veggie isle.

The Robin seemed to have set up residence at the end of one of the vegetable isles, where many perches were to be found, from which to talk or maybe rage at the world. This bird seemed not to be that bothered by the passing shoppers, regularly picking perches, close to the shoppers wanderings including passing shopping trolleys that were stationary for too long. If the Robin was raging at the world, then I’m not sure that the bird’s presence was much to the liking of all the customers either, from the various looks of horror on some of the faces. I suspected that the shoppers wished to rage at the bird to, for invading their safe sterile environment.

Robin – 27 November 2012 (Copyright Ross Lockley)

A recurring theme for the Robin was the annoying presence of its reflection in a mirror at the end of a display. The Robin would regularly display at this imaginary bird and when this wasn’t enough to see the competition off, the bird would then attack this reflection for a couple of furious seconds. The territorial nature of Robins is well known and their hatred of their own reflection has regularly been reported, but it is something that I have never actually seen in reality. Though important to the bird it is but a futile activity that will never see a winner.

Lost In A Moment

Still limited to light duties, I was looking at the world out of the window again, this time at the passing clouds. Observing clouds reminds me of long hot summer days, lying on the grass and making pictures of them as they passed by. Today was no different, apart from the weather and the temperature, but still there is this fascination of attempting to make shapes and pictures as they pass.

Today it was that of a jolly giant’s face, to me it definitely had a distinctive eye and a darker eyebrow, below which was highlighted a cheek, it was almost possible to  see it as being bright red cheek, then there was a large chuckling mouth. But with all cloud pictures some of it was left to the imagination for there was no nose and no chin. Then within seconds the face itself had departed into the whorl of cloud, nothing but an ephemeral image.

Clouds can also mean the possibility of showers, and as suddenly as the face appeared in the cloud and was gone, there also came a shower of rain and with it an amazingly bright rainbow. Easily showing all seven colours and rapidly arcing round to produce a hundred and eighty degree arc, but in the minute it took to get the camera and out to take a picture. The rain had stopped and the rainbow was fading rapidly away to nothing.

Rapidly Fading Rainbow – 17 November 2012 (Copyright Carol Jones)

Such are the ephemeral nature of clouds and rainbows. – Grab the images while you can, for they are here but for a moment and then gone the next.