Put out an Egyptian tour brochure, and you could think of them as Desert
Foxes.

As I walked the dog this afternoon, I noticed the poplars down by the stream
were turning a vivid shade of brown. Autumn is definitely not too far away.
And what happened to the wild blackberries this year? The crop locally was
either non-existent, or very paltry and tasteless.

jim, Northampton

"jbm" wrote in message
...
Put out an Egyptian tour brochure, and you could think of them as Desert
Foxes.

As I walked the dog this afternoon, I noticed the poplars down by the
stream were turning a vivid shade of brown. Autumn is definitely not too
far away. And what happened to the wild blackberries this year? The crop
locally was either non-existent, or very paltry and tasteless.

jim, Northampton

Fantastic blackberries on dartmoor Jim. They need rain to swell and sun to
ripen properly, like all berries.

Will
--

On Sep 5, 2:10*pm, Howard Neil wrote:
Will Hand wrote:

"Lawrence Jenkins" wrote in message
. ..
I saw the foxes in my garden looking very interested in a Caribbean
Cruise brochure that had been discarded. *What does it all mean??

Leaves starting to turn here now Lawrence and house martins have left
early. If I see a sheep farmer I'll ask him what it all means, oh ah! :-)

Will
--

But, on this newsgroup, we have our own way of telling what the winter
will bring. Are you chopping logs yet, Will? ;-)

--
Howard Neil

Its that time of year we look for natures (!!) clues as to the coming
winter........

I look every year and I'm I've only discovered one good one at the
start of Autumn and that helps me to forecast the UK winter
temperatures for the next, say, 50 years.

The only clue from nature to the coming winter, for me, is that we are
in a warming trend and nature has responded to it and warmed (I'm
including the atmosphere and oceans in "nature" here. More of a
meteorological gaia really!). The UK can't escape that trend, so the
coming winter is likely to be warmer than the long-term Manley mean
with regard to temperature. Likely; not certain. Using hindsight since
about 1980, it's about about 75-80% likely. That does not mean that we
can't get a cold winter and it does not mean we can't get a severe
winter, it just makes both much less likely than they were three
decades ago. It is likely that temperratures will be below average at
some times this winter and it is likely that most areas will see some
snow at some time. Exactly when, during the winter, is more of a
mystery, though it is more likely to be Jan/Feb than December.

What is as reliable as berries ripening in Autumn is that we'll soon
get the good old raft of winter forecasts; most of these will predict
really cold weather at some time, or another, between December and
January, for this reason, or for that reason. Please read every one
with a cynical eye, enjoy the good (sometimes "interesting" rather
than good) meteorology and climatology......then pour a large bag of
salt over each one, even though most will contain the cold that almost
all Internet people (including me as long as it doesn't last long!)
are hoping for. If the word "teleconnection" is mentioned in the
forecast pour an extra bag of salt for good measure. The claims for
the definite effects of how particular winter teleconnections will
evolve, affect the UK and produce the coldest winter in X years, are
often quite extraordinary.

Mind you, someone will get lucky this year and get their monthly
predictions almost the same as the winter's weather, but that does not
mean they have a meteorological looking glass. It means they got
lucky!

As to the how the coming UK winter will turn out........no-one knows!
(nature, especially)

Rain we've had, sun we haven't. Managed to cut the lawns yesterday, the
first time for over a month it hasn't rained for three days straight. And
even then the mower kept clogging up all the time. And it did my back in,
though a little(?) hedge trimming was probably more to blame.

As for the blackberries, well. Normally I'll sit on the bank by the stream
gorging myself on them while the dog gets on with what dogs do best. None of
that this year; the grass has been too wet! I've asked around to find out
whose been nicking them all, but no one has had any at all. First year for
yonks we've had no blackberries - scandal. And chatting with the local
allotmenteers, they can't give away their runner beans, they are inundated
with the damn things. I froze a gift of 5lb last night, on top of 3lb last
weekend, with more promised next week. I'll run out of freezer space soon.
That must have been the fine weather we had earlier in the year (remember
the promise of a long hot summer? Who said that?), and the rain over the
last few weeks.

Still, it was a nice dry warm day today for a change, and last week's winds
didn't do too much damage in the recently cleared up woodland. Roll on
winter, and then we can have a moan about it. Last winter's temperatures
killed off my Passion Flowers; see what this year's will kill off.

jim, Northampton