Fading Towards Autumn

Catch up – this time with the changing seasons dating from the 04 September 2013.

After a long summer of sunshine and heat, the vegetation of the Scottish Borders was beginning to tell a tale of hard times and had a distinctive look of tiredness to it. An evening wander round Lindean Reservoir didn’t tell a different tale, but highlighted the changes that were going on all around. Here the grasslands had changed from the various greens of summer that were spotted with masses of colours to a scene of varying browns with just one or two spots of colour from the remaining late summer flowers. These colours came from a few Knapweed flowers that produced splashes of purples accompanied by the occasional white inflorescence from Sneezewort and Yarrow. Just a few examples remaining to remind us of the glories of the summer that had begun to fade and head towards the changes of autumn.

The glories of the autumn that was coming, were already visible in some of the surrounding trees. The leaves of a number had already begun to change from the dark greens associated with summer to the browns and oranges of autumn. Furthest advanced were those of the Rowan, who were already well on the way to an autumnal paper brown, a colour that was highlighted by a heavy crop of bright orange-red berries, so that each tree was like a beacon of orange against the tired greens and browns of the grasses.

The Setting Sun Across Lindean Reservoir – 04 September 2013 (Copyright Carol Jones)

As I’ve mentioned before the approach of autumn means that sunsets become much more accessible as they come at sensible times in the evening, and my early September trip to Lindean Reservoir was not to disappoint on this front. As the sun continued its journey towards the horizon, the final rays of the days sunlight caught touches of cloud that were sitting just above the horizon and began to warm them into a gentle orange. As the sun dropped lower in the sky the clouds began to thicken and the reds continued to warm into a fiery blaze, changing into a cauldron of colour so that the clouds looked as though they had caught fire and were ablaze in the heavens, before fading rapidly into the darkness of night.

The Cauldron of Fire Above the Three Brethren – 04 September 2013 (Copyright Carol Jones)

Passing of Summer

Thursday, on a what was a decidedly cold and blustery evening, I was out at Lindean Reservoir, where I was accompanied by a cold northerly wind and the occasional honk of the first of this years Geese returning south. Bringing home the fact that summer has now almost passed, and autumn and winter will be rapidly approaching.

With the passing of summer, the vegetation is now beginning to look distinctly tired and worn. The grasslands have a distinctive brown tinge as the remaining inflorescences have set seed and dried out. There are only a few spots of colour remaining from the odd flower, making the occasional mauve, yellow and cream splash to highlight the now drab appearance of the sward. Above the scattering of trees round the reservoir edge have leaves that are beginning to turn brown, some have even dropped most of them leaving just the bare branches to announce the coming of winter.

Lindean Reservoir at Dusk – 12 September 2012 (Copyright Carol Jones)

But autumn means that sunsets are much more accessible, coming at a sensible time, rather than of way off in the early hours and Thursday night’s was a good introduction to those to come. The sky had begun to darken, as a number of shower clouds began to gather, as the grey clouds grew they took on a delicate apricot hue of the setting sun, while the sky to the west remained clear with a delicate tinge of blue. A reminder of the summer, maybe? As the clouds grew, so did the depth of colour, as though someone was washing the clouds with successively deeper orange coloured washes. Always they remained in the oranges, never quiet making the transition into red. Maybe not the fire of classic sunsets, but when reflected in the still areas of the water surface a spectacular sight, never the same for two minutes in a row. Then just as the rain came to wash away the orange colour, out came a final sight of a rainbow, with its start somewhere around Nether Whitlaw Moss and its end in the direction of either Blackpool or Beanrig Moss.

Rainbows at Dusk – 12 September 2012 (Copyright Carol Jones)