Autumnal bracken

click photo to enlarge
A warm, sunny autumn morning suggested a walk in the woods at Woodhall Spa. This location and time of year makes for a pleasant meander down the lanes, tracks and roads, surrounded as they are by an area of lowland heath. Yellowing silver birches and oaks, fly agaric and shaggy inkcap toadstools, and spiders' webs dripping with dew are all likely subjects to find at this time of year. However, I had a feeling we were three or four weeks early for the full-blown sights of autumn. And so it proved.

But, in places the bracken was turning from green to brown with hints of red, orange and purple, and I came upon this patch illuminated by a shaft of sunlight that was penetrating the still thick leaf canopy above.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Photo Title: Bracken, Woodhall Spa, Lincolnshire
Camera: Sony RX100
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 28.5mm (77mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f5.6
Shutter Speed: 1/80 sec
ISO:250
Exposure Compensation: -0.7EV

It's rhododendron time

click photo to enlarge
It's the end of May and the rhododendrons at Woodhall Spa in Lincolnshire are beginning to display at their best, their large, opulent, very un-English blooms drawing admiring glances from all who pass by. I admire them too. But, having lived in North West England, and having experienced the rhododendron-choked woods of the Forest of Bowland, I also admire the way that the rhododendrons in this Lincolnshire location are periodically controlled, cut back and cleared from areas.

I was reading recently that the horizontal growth and spread of a single rhododendron ponticum can cover 100 square metres. The Victorian landowners, who planted them as cover for their game-birds and as exotic and beautiful additions to their woods and country house grounds, didn't realise the environmental headache they were bequeathing to future generations. These rapidly growing plants quickly spread, denying native plants their space. They have few natural enemies - insects don't like them and rarely damage them, birds are scarce around them for lack of insects, and mammals don't eat their leathery, poisonous leaves. The few rogue sheep or cattle that do usually become sick and often die. In an area of lowland heath such as Woodhall Spa they are particularly problematic because silver birch, a short-lived tree, is common. Consequently when such a tree dies its space is quickly taken and new trees cannot grow up through the rhododendrons due to the lack of light at low levels. If the shrub didn't have such eye-catching flowers rhododendrons would surely have been cleared from woods years ago.

I searched long and hard for this specimen for my photograph. I was looking for a flower in the dark recess of a bush with strong contrast between the light, bright bloom and the darker leaves and shadows. I also wanted a flower with a fairly regular, radiating "ruff" (as I call the ring of leaves). A slight, dark vignette has been added to my shot to emphasise the natural contrast.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Olympus E-M10
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 96mm (192mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f4.9
Shutter Speed: 1/250 sec
ISO:500
Exposure Compensation: -0.33 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Spring in the woods

click photo to enlarge
We recently walked from Woodhall Spa to the tiny hamlet of Martin (see church in previous post) and back, a distance of about 9 miles. Quite a lot of our footpaths took us through trees. Lincolnshire isn't a county known for its woodland but it has more than the popular image suggests, and in places trees are really quite plentiful.

At this time of year the leaf canopy isn't fully developed. Consequently quite a bit of light still makes its way to the woodland floor. Bluebells and ramsons use this brief period as an opportunity to grow and flower. On our walk it was wood anemones that were taking advantage of the brightness: in places it looked like a light fall of large snowflakes had descended in the night. We heard chiff chaffs and a cuckoo, their distinctive calls further emphasising that spring is the season and winter is past.

Towards the start of our walk I photographed a subject that I'd photographed (and posted before). The track that goes through the woods that form part of the National Golf Centre, with its three courses, is a public footpath. This landscape is what is usually known as lowland heath. Silver birches and oaks are common in the woods and flashes of yellow gorse can be seen all year round. Here, however, the folly of the Victorians is also very evident because in several places the woodland is choked by rhododendrons. These will be spectacular when they are in full flower in a couple of weeks time but for the rest of the year they will be a dense mass of glossy greenery. But in the area of my photograph it is the slender silver birches that predominate making the woodland light, bright and almost cheery.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Nikon D5300
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 18mm (27mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f7.1
Shutter Speed: 1/125 sec
ISO:100
Exposure Compensation: -0.33 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Dogs and me

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I've said elsewhere in this blog that I'm not a "doggy person". I have no problem with dogs, they seem to like me, I don't mind them, and I don't have any irrational fear or dislike of them. I grew up with dogs and always had at the back of my mind that one day I'd have one. But I can't see that happening. They would require me to change the way I now live and I'm not prepared to give that up for a pet. I value spontaneity, the ability to drop everything and pursue a fancy of the moment. I don't especially like planning ahead - I did too much of that in my working life - and dogs require planning. They also prevent you from entering too many buildings where dogs are not allowed.

However, the photographer in me is grateful to those who do have dogs, who exercise them, and in so doing regularly provide me with a human element or an indication of scale in my photographic compositions. I've lost count of the landscapes that I've shot where I deliberately include a dog walker. So, though dogs are not for me, I value them nonetheless.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Nikon D5300
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 112mm (168mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f8
Shutter Speed: 1/200 sec
ISO:400
Exposure Compensation: -0.33 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Photographic drought

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Most of the photographs I post on this blog are reasonably current; they appear rarely more than ten days to a fortnight since I took the shot. Sometimes, however, I break this self-imposed rule and post a photograph that may have been taken a month or two earlier, or sometimes six months to a year earlier. The circumstances that lead to this departure from usual practice are two-fold. Firstly, I sometimes decide that a photograph I overlooked is one I should have used. And secondly there are times when my life is so busy that I run out of new photographs - or rather, new photographs that I think suitable fro posting. Today's shot is one of the latter group.

It's a photograph I like, and had I not posted one quite similar last year, I'd have posted it around 27th October when I secured it. So, today it's here because I have little else to offer. My previous effort was posted later in the year so the silver birches have fewer leaves than those above and there is no green bracken to be seen (there are few such fronds in the shot above). So, to appease anyone who craves novelty above an attempt to produce a better shot of the same subject, today's image is bigger (1000 pixels across) rather than my usual 700 pixels. The size we view images is really important in our appreciation of them. Landscapes, in particular, benefit from bigger sizes. I'd love to post all my images on a larger scale but they just get used and mis-used without acknowledgement or permission when I do, so today's will be one of the few that get this treatment.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Nikon D5300
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 45mm (67mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f8
Shutter Speed: 1/180 sec
ISO:200
Exposure Compensation: -0.33 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Pine trees and weather forecasting

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I think that if retirement ever becomes boring - an unlikely eventuality - then I will become a weather forecaster. On the basis of the accuracy (or should I say inaccuracy) of recent forecasts for my part of the world I think my efforts have every chance of reaching the current high (or should I say low) standard on offer.

A couple of days ago, on the promise of sunshine and cloud with long spells of unbroken sun, we went walking at Woodhall Spa hoping to get some well-lit, autumn-themed, landscape and tree photographs. However, the forecast sun made a couple of fleeting appearances and then remained hidden by a blanket of cloud for the rest of our time there. On the day I write this we went shopping, me without a coat because no rain was forecast all day, and I was precipitated upon! These are only two of the many mis-forecasts of recent weeks. However, today's papers tell me all will soon be well because the Meteorological Office has ordered a new £97 million super computer. This will have a prodigious number-crunching capacity enabling previously unimagined quantities of data to be processed. The technological behemoth will spit out forecasts of undreamed of accuracy. Or so they say. We'll see.

On my Woodhall Spa walk I managed to get a couple of shots of passing interest. The stack of tree trunks appealed for the unexpected colours on display. They'd clearly been there a while so hints of green are not to be unexpected. But what about the blue?  Is it natural or was it applied in the cutting? I think it's the former. It seemed a good photograph to pair with the shot of some trees before they succumb to the woodsman's saw.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Photo 1
Camera: Nikon D5300
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 75mm (112mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f8
Shutter Speed: 1/125 sec
ISO:11250
Exposure Compensation: -0.33 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Bracken and silver birches

click photo to enlarge
The other day, while walking in the vicinity of Woodhall Spa, we passed Highall Wood. Not unusually for woodland in that area of Lincolnshire the two dominant species were bracken and silver birch. I stopped to take a photograph of the pale, flecked trunks of the slender trees rising out of the blanket of brown bracken, plants that only a couple of months ago would have been a sea of green. A few pale, yellow leaves still clung to the thin branches of the trees, though as I write this, a couple of days later, I suspect the recent stronger gusts have brought even those stragglers down.

As I child in the Yorkshire Dales I loved bracken and played in it on the hillsides. We liked the way the individual fronds uncurled and the fact that it grew taller than children making it ideal for hide and seek. But, ever since I discovered that the plant has carcinogenic properties I've viewed it in a different light. Apparently the relatively high incidence of stomach and oesophagal cancers in Japan and Korea may be connected to a liking by those countries for the plant as a foodstuff. When I read this I wondered if I needed to be concerned by the plants' air-borne spores too. I'm not aware that bracken has ever been eaten by people in Britain, but I do know it was used here for thatching cottage roofs, as bedding for humans and animals, as fuel for the fire and as a floor covering. Today it is generally seen as an invasive pest that takes over pasture, something to be controlled and eradicated. In the wood above it appears to be growing wherever it likes. As I walked on I wondered whether the way in which it carpeted the woodland floor led to its roots reducing the already short lives (in tree terms) of the silver birches.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Sony RX100
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 17.8mm (48mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f5
Shutter Speed: 1/100 sec
ISO:125
Exposure Compensation: 0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Rhododendrons, the beautiful invaders

click photo to enlarge
The rhododendron (Rhododendron ponticum) was introduced to the British Isles some time around the year 1763. It was valued as an attractive, evergreen shrub that in May and June produced multiple, large and showy flowers. Its popularity grew and in the nineteenth century it became a staple of large gardens, parks and hunting estates (where it provided shelter for game species) on the wetter, western side of Britain where the soils were acidic. As well as this particular species being widely planted it was also used as a rootstock for hardy, cultivated varieties. With this high level of interest the rhododendron quickly became established and started to spread. By the twentieth century it became recognised for what it was; a rapidly invasive coloniser, filling woodland floors beneath the tree canopy, spreading into moorland and heathland, a plant that suppressed and replaced native species and made forestry much more difficult and expensive. Today the Forestry Commission has programmes of control designed to subdue the rhododendron and remove it from areas where it is not wanted.

One can understand the enthusiasm with which Victorian gardeners adopted the plant. It is like no other evergreen shrub when it is in flower. Not only are the individual blooms very big, they are numerous and quite beautiful. When seen en masse on a large group of bushes the sight is quite overpowering. As a child I enjoyed seeing the purple flowers on the millstone grit rock outcrops and in the woods near Settle in the Yorkshire Dales. In later life I sought out the varieties that Victorian landowners had planted around Bleasdale and Abbeystead in Lancashire's Forest of Bowland: various shades of purple, red, yellow, orange and white could be found. Today I make a point of visiting Woodhall Spa to see the annual show of multicoloured exuberance. Were I a forester, of course, any pleasure I got from the beauty of the flowers would be seriously tempered by the cost and work involved in controlling their spread.

Today's main photograph was taken in the Yorkshire Dales. The shot shows something of the glow that each flower exhibits when seen against the dark green, shiny leaves. The smaller photograph was taken the other day in the grounds of the Petwood Hotel in Woodhall Spa. These rhododendrons, a pink cultivar probably closely related to the ponticum variety, were planted in the early 1900s - about a century ago - and today, in places, form veritable "cliffs" of blooms 25 to 30 feet high.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Photo 1
Camera: Canon
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 250mm
F No: f5.6
Shutter Speed: 1/200
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation:  -0.33 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Afternoon tea at the Petwood

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I'm a northerner, born and bred. Consequently I have breakfast shortly after I rise - porridge and a cup of tea all year round for me - dinner is what I eat near noon, tea is a meal I consume around five o'clock (teatime) and supper is a small snack and more tea (cup of) an hour or two before bed. I often have a mid-morning cup of coffee or tea and a mid-afternoon cup of tea. The names I give to my mid-day meal and evening meal are not those used in the southern half of England however. In these parts, generally, what I call dinner is called lunch, and my tea is called dinner and is eaten later, perhaps around seven o'clock. Confusingly, in southern England an evening meal is sometimes referred to as supper. The southern way is to have afternoon tea of, perhaps, a cup of tea and a buttered scone to fill the hunger gap between lunch and dinner. These names are not regionally hard and fast because social class differences sometimes cause northern people to adopt the southern terminology. All of which is confusing enough for the natives; it must baffle visitors to our country.

One of my sons and his wife visited recently and while we were out one dull, damp and overcast day we stopped off at Woodhall Spa. In this large village is a memorial in the form of a breached dam that commemorates the members of the RAF's 617 Squadron, "The Dambusters", who gave their lives during the second world war. Since the end of that conflict thirty further members of the squadron have died and a new memorial has recently been unveiled that will commemorate them. Lincolnshire is sometimes known as "Bomber County" because of the large number of airfields that were created here during WW2. Today it continues to be the home of some of the RAF's largest airfields.

After a brief stroll round the streets and a viewing of the memorials we slipped into southern English mode and went to the Petwood Hotel for afternoon tea and cake. This former large house in the Edwardian Elizabethan-cum-Tudor "black and white" style, was built in 1905 for Grace Maple who became Baroness Von Eckhardstein and later Lady Weighall. In the 1930s it became a hotel and during the war it was requisitioned by the RAF as an officers' mess. The building contains much memorabilia from those days when pilots from 617 Squadron (who flew Lancasters) and 627 Squadron (who flew Mosquitoes) based at the newly created airfield of RAF Woodhall Spa spent much of their off-duty time there.

My main photograph shows afternoon tea being taken in one of the Petwood's large, panelled rooms that overlook the extensive gardens that were full of rhododendrons in flower. The smaller photograph shows a view of the building's south elevation seen from near the Round Pool.

photographs and text © Tony Boughen

Photo 1
Camera: Sony RX100
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 10.4mm (28mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f6.3
Shutter Speed: 1/30
ISO: 200
Exposure Compensation:  -0.3 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Kinema in the Woods

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The charming and very unusual Kinema* in the Woods at Woodhall Spa, Lincolnshire, showed its first film in 1922. The cinema had been built from the remains of the sports pavilion of the Victoria Hotel that burned down in 1920. Programming on that opening evening featured a Charlie Chaplin film as the scheduled film didn't arrive in time. Most of the seats were the traditional "tip-up" variety but the front six rows were deck chairs, a feature that continued until as late as 1953.

The cinema is unusual in using rear projection. This is necessary due to the low roof timbers that would impede front projection. In the main auditorium (Screen One) the film is projected from behind the screen onto a mirror that flips the image before it goes on to the back of the screen. The building's current owners believe it is the only cinema in the UK still using this method of projection. In 1978 two electronically controlled sound projectors replaced the single sound projector that was first installed in 1928. A few years later in 1984, in a move that harked back to an earlier age in cinema and which underlined the owner's desire to make a visit to the Kinema in the Woods a real event, a Compton Kinestra organ was installed. This has a console with an ornate design in red and gold laquer. It is regularly played by the cinema's resident organist. In 1994 a second auditorium with the name "Kinema Too" was opened.

The cinema is open every evening of the week with weekend matinees. I took my photograph after an evening appointment in Woodhall Spa. Before my journey home I drove through the woods to the cinema in the hope that it was open and lit up for the evening and found it busy and surrounded by cars. The smaller photograph is a shot of the writing, illumination and advertising on the main facade. On the central gable it says,"England's Unique Cinema, Films Nightly. Down Memory Lane: The Kinema's Nostalgia Show - Featuring the Mighty Compton Organ".

* The spelling "kinema" rather than the usual "cinema" was much more common in the early days of movie film. The "k" comes from its derivation from the original Greek word for "motion". Words such as kinematographic, kinematoscope and kinema were coined as movies took off, but in time were replaced by versions beginning with "c". The original cinematographers would have been familiar with the word, "kinematics" that was used in the nineteenth century (from 1840) to describe the science of pure motion.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Sony RX100
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 10.4mm (28mm - 35mm equiv.)
F No: f2.8
Shutter Speed: 1/15
ISO: 800
Exposure Compensation:  0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

The ones that got away

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Photographers are like fishermen: they dwell upon the ones that got away. I can still see the shot I missed when an enormous sheet of agricultural plastic, more than 100 feet long, blew past me and floated over a bungalow, twisting and turning in the air, a surrealistic sight that I came upon when I was without a camera. And the photographs that I've missed when driving along roads where stopping was dangerous or forbidden are too numerous to mention. However, the failure to get photographs on these occasions can be be easily forgiven; you simply feel that fate, circumstance - call it what you will - were against you. What's harder to deal with is when you see a shot, consider how to secure the best that it offers, and still don't end up with the photograph you wanted. Today's two images are examples of this phenomenon.

We were walking through some trees at Woodhall Spa, Lincolnshire, when the tip of a beech tree branch hanging low against a background of foliage caught my eye. There was no light coming through the trees behind, so I knew there would be no circular highlights to detract from the serpentine line of the twig or the delicacy and fine colours of the leaves. I opened the aperture to f4.5 to blur the background and mounted the 70-300mm lens to provide a longer focal length to further increase the blur, then took the main shot at 141mm. The composition and the light through the leaves is just what I wanted. However, I could see from the LCD that the background could do with more blur. So, I took a second shot. For this one I increased the focal length to 300mm. Then, knowing that the depth of field would be very shallow, opened the aperture to f5.6 (hardly worth the change). I took my shot looking carefully at the background, and was very satisfied with it. However, when I came to look at both shots on the computer I realised that I'd missed my composition on the second shot even though I'd got my background as I wanted. If I'd been paying better attention I'd have got the composition of the main photograph with the background of the smaller one. My next chance of that particular confluence of details is probably next autumn!

photographs and text © Tony Boughen

Photo 1
Camera: Canon
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 141mm
F No: f4.5
Shutter Speed: 1/160
ISO: 1000
Exposure Compensation:  0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Viewing distance, size and landscapes

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There are many factors that affect our appreciation of a photograph, but today's image made me think again about two that are linked, and that are crucially important: viewing distance and size.

The increasing use of notebook and tablet computers has slowed the rise in the average dimension of computer displays. Desktop systems still, generally, have the biggest displays, and often they are the best quality. As far as the appreciation of photographs on screens is concerned the increasing resolution of the newer devices' smaller displays has only partly compensated for the trend to smaller screens, but as with photographic prints, viewing at the closer distance that tablets require shows the image to better effect than the same display seen from further away. It is widely held that, in general terms, the best viewing distance for a picture (including a photograph) equates to the length of its diagonal, and people naturally gravitate to this kind of point. That being so, we scrutinize small images from nearer viewpoints than larger ones.

But what is it that determines the size we make that image? Often it's to do with where it will be displayed, sometimes impact is the governing factor, and other times the subject is crucial. As far as subject matter goes I've always found that the force of certain photographic subjects depends very much on the size at which they are displayed on a screen or seen in the form of a print. Portraits, subjects with bold contrast, and quite a lot of reportage are often fine in relatively small sizes. However, landscapes, particularly those where the mid-ground and background take up a significant area of the whole lose crucial detail when small and frequently benefit from being displayed as a big print or screen image.

I thought this when I reduced the size of today's photograph to make the 700 pixels wide web image for the blog: a lot of what I liked about it disappeared. So, rather than say any more on this subject, decide for yourself by comparing it with the 1250 pixels wide version, itself a significant reduction from the original 5616 pixels width.

photograph and text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Canon
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 24mm
F No: f7.1
Shutter Speed: 1/60 sec
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation:  -0.33 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Autumn at Woodhall Spa

click photo to enlarge

On a recent overcast day, we took a six or seven mile stroll through some woods and lanes in Lincolnshire, a county that is, in the popular consciousness, a treeless place. Our starting point was the village of Woodhall Spa, a place whose very name suggests that it may be a wooded spot. Located between the chalk and the limestone, Woodhall Spa features heather and bracken, many tree types including silver birch, beech and oak, and has soil that can support the widespread rhododendrons that the Victorians and Edwardians planted. Mature woodland adjoins and penetrates the large village and mature trees can be seen in many gardens. For anyone who doesn't know Woodhall Spa the late John Betjeman called it "that half-timbered Bournemouth-like settlement", a description that sums up the look and feel of the place quite well.

The English National Golf Centre and its courses are found here. Apparently - and I'm no golfer so I can't attest to this - the Hotchkin Course is a classic British heathland course and was voted "25th best course in the world" by Golf World Magazine. What I do know is that a public footpath winds through the courses and adjacent woodlands and the semi-wild landscape makes quite a nice start to a ramble from the village centre. On our walk the colours of the autumn leaves were just starting to decline in intensity but were still very attractive, and I managed a few shots as we followed a track through a tunnel of trees. In the one above my photographic assistant - aka my wife - was persuaded to be the focal point in the "tunnel".

photograph and text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Canon
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 183mm
F No: f6.3
Shutter Speed: 1/200
ISO: 1250
Exposure Compensation:  -0.67 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

British, Americans and the problem of names

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People get confused about the name of the group of small islands off the western edge of mainland Europe. Geographically speaking they are known as the British Isles, though people in Eire (The Republic of Ireland) might wish for a name that doesn't emphasise Britain quite so much. The political name for the majority of the area of the islands is the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (UK), a term that embraces the constituent countries of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. Great Britain is a name that covers the first three of these but excludes Northern Ireland. The Republic of Ireland (Eire) is an independent country in its own right. This isn't properly understood by many in the UK, so it's not surprising that people from other countries struggle with it.

There is further confusion about how to term a native of the UK. "British" (not the hideous modern term, "Brit") is used to describe anyone from the four countries. However, people who should know better - journalists especially - often use England and English instead, much to the annoyance of the Welsh, Scottish and Northern Irish. Is there any wonder that the other day the Argentine foreign minister made the same mistake when some of the natives of these islands aren't sufficiently precise in their usage.

But it's not only in the UK where these kind of problems are found. Take the United States of America. The people of that country refer to themselves as Americans; and so they are. But they use the name in such a way that suggests it applies only to natives of the U.S.A., something that doesn't go down well in Canada, Mexico and the myriad countries of Central and South America who also see themselves (quite rightly) as Americans because that is the continent on which they reside. Perhaps the people of the United States need a second name in the way that the people of Canada, Chile and all the other countries on the American continent do. I have heard Usanian put forward as a possible answer! How does that sound, or would it be as unwelcome as Brit is to me?

What has this got to do with a small water-course among the trees at Woodhall Spa, Lincolnshire? Not a great deal. In fact nothing at all.

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Lumix LX3
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 5.1mm (24mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f2
Shutter Speed: 1/30
ISO: 160
Exposure Compensation: 0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Woodland

click photo to enlarge
It's good that the area of the UK covered in trees is increasing year on year, and has now climbed to 12% of the total land area. Woodland is important as a wildlife habitat, landscape element, recreational resource, carbon sink, and source of fuel and raw materials.

But, whilst the UK has a slightly greater amount of woodland cover than the Netherlands (11%) it has a long way to go to reach the level of our continental neighbours such as France (28.3%) and Germany (31.7%). Moreover it trails the European Union average (37.8%) by a big margin. It's also unfortunate that more than half of the UK's present woods are coniferous plantations whose biodiversity, landscape and recreational potential is substantially less than that of broadleaved woodland.

A while ago I read, "The History of the Countryside", Oliver Rackham's important work on Britain's landscape, flora and fauna. It gave me a more informed insight into the decline of our woodlands and scotched a few myths that still infect debate about this subject - neither the contruction of Britain's navy nor the early iron industry were, it seems, major contributors to the loss of woodland. It also helped me to understand the key difference between traditional, sustainable forms of forestry and the current practice. Modern methods of wood production are likened by Rackham to the growing of vegetables: you plant a sapling, nurture it until it is a size to crop, then cut it down, removing all trace of it from the ground. The older method usually involved a cycle of coppicing, where limbs were harvested from the tree in such a way that it encouraged more growth. Wood was harvested every several years, and the tree continued in production for hundreds of years. More enlightened woodland management is re-discovering the value of coppicing not only in economic terms, but also for biodiversity.

The place where I now live, Lincolnshire, isn't the first English county that one thinks of in terms of woodland. However, it does have a few spots where trees grow in relative plenty. One such, as the name suggests, is Woodhall Spa, where I took this photograph of my wife walking through the sylvan, early autumn landscape.

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 79mm (158mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f6.3
Shutter Speed: 1/160
ISO: 200
Exposure Compensation: -1.0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Puzzles and perplexities

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I must admit to being puzzled and perplexed by many aspects of the modern world. The other day I was skipping through a mental list of them. Here, for your amusement and edification are just a few from my extensive collection:

• "personalised" car number plates: what's that all about, and why would you pay extra to have them?
• upgrading mobile phones: I'm given to understand that some people do this every 12 or 18 months, a fact that leaves my gast completely flabbered
• paying a premium price for clothing that has advertisements on it: surely anyone in their right mind should be asking for a discount on a garment when the word ADIDAS, GAP or MONSOON is emblazoned across it?
• tucking laces into shoes rather than fastening them: who is responsible for that daft idea, what was his IQ, and why did people take any notice?
• why can't I buy shoes with soles made with the same rubber as my car tyres? that way they wouldn't wear out when the uppers are still looking good for several thousand more miles
• women wearing sun glasses on top of their head whatever the weather: have they lost their case, have they lost their marbles, or are they just optimists who always expect the sun to shine on them?

And then there's golf! Try as I might I can't understand why, among all the possible pastimes that mankind has come up with, anyone should choose golf. The premise of the game seems to be that getting a very small ball into a very small hole, in the smallest number of hits, with implements whose design makes that task even more difficult, is a worthwhile way to spend time. I can see that it certainly fills time, but to what end? All that happens is you get better at doing something that was always ridiculous in the first place. The enthusiasts say, "Ah, but you're out in the fresh air getting exercise." Well that's true, but you can get that more gainfully in many other ways - country walking, bird watching, photography(!), and anyway, Mark Twain's "a good walk spoiled" is the last word on that defence. Friendly competition and socialising are also proferred in support, but most social games - darts, snooker, tennis, bowling, etc - offer that. And don't get me started on the despoiling of the land by habitat destruction, pesticides, herbicides, fertilizers and the like. No, golf is a completely closed book to me.

However, it's possible to get a photograph out of most situations, and golf is no exception. Today's - only my second golf-related photograph ever (here's my first) - was taken as I walked up the drive (it's also a public footpath) of the National Golf Centre in Woodhall Spa, Lincolnshire. The yellow morning light was filtering and slicing through the trees, burning off a slight frost, and producing areas that glowed warmly, contrasting with the blue hue of the places still in the shade. A recent wind had produced an early fall of leaves that were turning russet on the ground, and a gentler breeze was now dislodging one or two more as we made our way through the golf courses, photographing and noting the wildlife at the start of our walk.

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 64mm (128mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f6.3
Shutter Speed: 1/150
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation: -0.7 EV
Image Stabilisation: On