A Walk in Lower Tarras

My morning walk today was from The Maverick Bird Hide to Perterburn and back in Lower Tarras Valley a distance of 4 miles.

After much discussion on Facebook we have decided this is a Kestrel photographed at Perterburn.

This is Middlemoss in the distance

Looking up The Tarras and Little Tarras Valley

These 2 fields enclosed by Dry Stane dykes at the back of Whita have been called The Bible Fields as far as I can remember. 

The Rashiel Cottage and one of the nicest places to live in the area. I have been there during the Walking Festival when we were allowed to see a Barn Owl nest and I have a couple of times seen a Barn Owl hunting in the field in front of the house.

Plenty of water in the Tarras but not running brown like the Esk was this morning

Tarras Bridge

This is a very marshy area near Tarras bridge. At one time during the Moorland Education Project we had plans to turn this area into a pond but it needed planning permission and we did not have sufficient funds. Perhaps that will happen when the Tarras Valley Nature Reserve is set up.

 

Lockdown January Walks

It has been a very cold January and as we are again in Lockdown I have decided not to even go far out of Langholm for my daily walks. These photographs are a collection of all my walks during the second half of January. I have only missed one day of walking since Christmas and am managing to average almost 5 miles per day.

This is on the walk that I call The Curly Snake and it runs parallel to The Lodge Walks and comes out at Pathhead near Buccleuch Estates offices.

Plenty of ice on the Tarras road between Skippers Bridge and the turnoff for Jenny Nobles Gill

The Castleholm

On the way round Jenny Nobles Gill

My most regular walk is round by The Pheasant Pens and this Robin regularly comes up to me near Holmhead. I have started to feed him some seed so he is becoming very friendly.

This is called Hair Ice and there has been a lot of it about this month.

The river Esk at Hollows Bridge on the one occasion I ventured a wee bit further for a walk

I normally walk on my own in the morning and then in the afternoon go for a shorter walk with Gaye. We certainly make sure that we are appropriately dressed for the situation.

The face mask certainly improves my looks.

The Castleholm and Langholm Lodge

Easton's Walk and the path was very slippy so Tom is hanging onto the fence to save himself from falling

Jenny Nobles Gill walk on the frostiest morning

This is well below Skippers Bridge on the Esk and Mike Tinker pointed out to me that Birds Nest Orchids grow here in the summer. 

The monument on our most snowy day. We have been very fortunate and missed most of the really bad weather but did have some very cold nights with the coldest being about -12C

 

A Cold start to January

Since my last blog on 8th January we have had a spell of dry but cold weather that has enabled me to walk almost every day and on the sunniest day I headed out to The Langholm Moor and the upper Tarras Valley. This Wild Feral Goat was very close to the road and happy to pose for me. 

One of the Gulls posing on the fence posts at the Kilngreen

The upper Tarras Valley

More Feral Goats

The Meeting of the Waters Ewes and Esk

Mr. Tootlepedal on one of his daily walks during this cold spell as he is unable to cycle at the moment except of course on his bicycle that goes nowhere in his garage.

The Langholm Monument on Whita Hill

The Meeting of the Waters on the coldest morning

The Ewes at the Kilngreen

 

A Beautiful Winters Day

Since New Years day the temperature has hardly been above zero but today was the best day I have had this year to date for walking. It's still tricky underfoot but the sunshine was glorious and the scenery wonderful. I have been walking my regular low level walks this week and not venturing into the hills so this was my usual walk round the Pheasant Pens today. It's worth noting that last year in January I spotted my first Snowdrops on 1st January but this year not a sign of them yet. 

Langholm Castle in all its glory.

This is Clerk Fell next to the road to Potholm

Clerk Fell and Pedens View

All the time I was walking a pair of Buzzards were calling and I finally managed to get a photograph of one of them as it settled on a tree