The Dazzle and Flurry of Spring

This time of year is a riot of colour, energy, movement and life. Hedgerows are bursting forth with blossom and leaves, and flitting busy birds are displaying and pairing up, building their nests and gathering food. The trees shimmer with emerald green finery and the meadows look lush and fully clothed again.

It is a beautiful time. I can barely stay indoors, yet choosing where to go when I step outside is challenging.

Do I head up into the hills to watch the descending flight of skylarks larking in the sky? Do I head over to the old church to watch the circling house martins shoring up their nests for the season ahead? Do I go down to the river to catch a glimpse of dipper, merganser, mallard and - if I am very lucky - a kingfisher?

Do I go all out for drama and head to my local RSPB site to view the fantastic aerial displays of ospreys fishing, marsh harriers expertly passing food to each other in the air, and grebes displaying? Or do I sit quietly in my own garden, watching delicate orange-tipped butterflies drift past, and glimpsing the willow warbler in my hedge?

‘Osprey’s Descent’ and ‘Flight of the Wild Swans’ - both currently on exhibition at Brantwood House, Coniston.

WHAT IS ALL AROUND US?

I was recently out walking with a friend who was startled by how much wildlife I was noticing. She considered herself pretty alert, but remarked that she was only seeing half of what I saw. Her comment stayed with me—it made me realise how much my noticing has changed over the past year.

I know that I have learnt to see and hear differently. I notice things now that once would have passed me by. I can discern a shifting shape more clearly and bring my attention to it quickly, reading something of its meaning through habitat, movement, season and silhouette. I am more attuned to birdsong too—both individual calls and the wider soundscape that hints at something stirring. I feel more immersed in the weave of things.

WHAT HAS LEAD TO THIS DEEPER NOTICING?

First and foremost, many hours spent in Nature being quiet, still and open. Time in a lovely glade or on a hilltop or by a river, settling patiently, open to what it might show me and teach me. These are hours where my whole system settles and I feel the knots of life soften and dissolve as I become fully present.

We don’t need to be clued up on nature to go and sit in nature. The birds and butterflies and bees will come and go, leaving us a little richer—whether or not we understand what they are.

The many lovely nature books I have been reading this past year have also had a quiet influence. Books written by people who have allowed themselves to steep in time spent outdoors, observing closely, absorbed in subject or place. Through their deep seeing I have been guided to listen and see more deeply myself.

When I come back, I feel quiet, fresh and happy. I go out without agenda or expectation, and I come back free from the paraphernalia of nagging thoughts that didn’t need my attention. Somewhere, subtly, this time translates—into paintings and writings, into more inner space for my family, into more presence in my work. A daily medicine that settles and nourishes me.

Arctic Terns, Bearded Tits and Grey Heron - all paintings inspired by bird walks around sites in Cumbria

AN ENCHANTED WALK

Yesterday evening, Bryan and I set off round our local loop, binoculars in hand, to see what we might see. We came back stunned by the richness in our own ‘back yard’.

Pausing to look at the view, we startled two roe deer who darted off into the woodland beyond. Moments later, a pair of greater spotted woodpeckers dove in above our heads towards their nesting site in a tree close by. Still watching them, we gradually became aware of a flicker of movement in our peripheral vision and turned to see a siskin resting quietly in a hazel tree beside us - its stunning green-yellow feathers, striped and stippled with black, blending perfectly with the spring leaves. Only the flicker of movement had given it away.

Turning back to the path, what looked like a chaffinch alighted on a sapling in front of us. We were about to dismiss it—but a closer look revealed a far more elusive bird: a female pied flycatcher. She was in no mood to move and calmly remained there, even as we eventually walked past her to continue on our way.

And still the scene unfolded. A mistle thrush piped up in the field below. Above, in the still-bright jewel-blue sky, a buzzard soared and mewed. The first swallows—just back this week—chattered through the air around us. And somewhere deeper in the foliage, a meadow pipit called.

What we would have missed if we hadn’t stopped to look and listen.

I came back fizzing with the need to paint all of it, to translate something of this energy and loveliness into art.

I would love to know what touches you about the Spring as it unfolds around you. What are you seeing? What do you make a point of going to find at this time each year - bluebell woods, cherry trees, birds nesting on the cliffs, hedgerows full of blossom? What moves you? And how does this all filter back into your everyday life?