So much profound beauty in our world. But it seems the forces unable to see beyond their own wealth, power, and egos are in the ascendant right now. It's our duty to mind ourselves and each other in these tough times, which may well get much worse. The living world depends on us never giving up. 🌍

Sound up for slomo bumbling and birdsong

Froggery croakery

We might yearn for paradise, temporal or spiritual. But to our descendents our habitable planet will look like an almost unimaginable paradise. No tech fantasy, no space station or controlled environment will ever compare. Fight for what we have. This is our heaven, and there can be no other.

A little trip to Painswick Rococo Garden to celebrate snowdrop time

St Edwards, Stow-on-the-Wold. That door gets a lot of visitors, partly because it is claimed to have inspired Tolkien’s Doors of Durin.

A favourite walk yesterday with a screaming ash confined above beautiful Chastleton house, ridge-and-furrow fields, curious sheep and a beech cathedral with gargoyles

Good lord, people! It's hoar frost, not whore frost. #hoarfrost

Day 24 of my Advent calendar. Happy Christmas to you all from me and my tiny garden angel

Charles Dahl's Dickens Chickens

Day 23 of my Advent calendar. Some unseasonal/seasonal red and green in the garden. No wonder we crave those colours in the winter gloom!

Day 22 of my Advent calendar. Dahlia ‘Labyrinth’ to warm us after going out in the icy wind to sing carols

Day 21 of my Advent calendar. Rejoice! The shortest day is over and before you know it the freshly-clothed oaks will be ankle deep in cow parsley.

Day 20 of my Advent calendar. While we’re in Edinburgh let’s have the view across the city from Salisbury crags. We climbed up and watched the setting sun play among the trees, hoping that a ray or two would illuminate the castle. Eventually we gave up and walked to Leith for jazz and fish pie.

Day 19 of my Advent calendar. This was one of my favourite paintings in The National Gallery of Scotland in Edinburgh. Thanks to my sister when I look at it I can hear Mr Hardwood from Blackadder III shouting “…I’ll take off my belt and by thunder my trousers will fall down!”

Day 18 of my Advent calendar. Let’s have a smattering of poppies

Day 17 of my Advent calendar. Knockvologan beach, Mull. She was standing on the sandy green clifftop watching the rest of the herd down on the beach, appreciating the view and thinking deeply. I looked back as we headed up the cliff path and she was contentedly scratching her bum on the bench.

Day 16 of my Advent calendar. Autumn in the pots - the car nestles in bright foliage at a time when the rest of the yard is a chaos of fading dahlias and desperate bulb planting

Day 15 of my Advent calendar. A memory from a trip to Bristol, when we sat on this balcony in Clifton drinking coffee and admiring our friends’ wisteria.

Hi lovely followers. Pls could you share the #nature #writing feed (shorturl.at/mI0aR) so that more interested folk can like & pin it? The community is growing & I'm loving the diversity of voices from across the world, in sciences & arts, using #naturewriting hashtag. Wood mouse says thank you! 🐭😊

Day 14 of my Advent calendar. I like a nice bit of stone walling - this herringbone pattern is Cornish.

Day 13 of my Advent calendar is green again. High on the hill a footpath threads between two rows of trees, most of them beech. I have always thought beech trunks look like there is muscle under the bark. When we’re not looking the trees probably dance off hand in hand along the path.

Day 12 of my Advent calendar is another from Cornwall. I don’t know which rhodie this is and I can’t even remember which Tre-garden it was in. Does it matter? It’s just a fizzy shot of pink and green on this dank December day.

Day 11 of my Advent calendar. As many of you know, I have a silly number of pots in the yard. Most visitors only notice the big, bright plants and so the tiny ones such as this little (about 6cm tall) Campanula cochlearifolia ‘Elizabeth Oliver’ are just for me.

Day 10 of my Advent calendar and it’s about time we had a horse nose. This one was on Port Meadow, Oxford

Let’s stay in Kent for day 9 of my Advent calendar. This is the nuttery at Sissinghurst, a green haven on a hot day

Day 8 of my Advent calendar is a snail. We had a short trip to Kent in May and as we walked through the woods near our B&B we met lots of Roman snails.Their shells are tough and their bodies muscular (stretching to about 4 inches). If your car breaks down in Kent just harness a couple of these.

Day 7 of my Advent calendar. Another one from Cornwall. I have a million pics of tree ferns from those gardens but I particularly love the underside of the silver fern, Cyathea dealbata embroidered with double rows of French knot sporangia.

Day 6 of my Advent calendar. Planting bulbs is a pretty tedious job, let’s be honest. But oh so worth it when we emerge from greybrown winter into tuliptime Technicolor

Day 5 of my Advent Calendar. The garden of St Michael’s Mount. Having worked as a professional gardener in public gardens for a big chunk of my life I know that many people look down on gardeners. Literally so here but at least the gardeners don’t have to listen to their fatuous comments.

Day 4 of my Advent Calendar. It has been quite a birdy year, including a trip to Staffa to fulfil a long-held ambition to see puffins. Flittering onto the cliff edge in front of us they strolled about with their hands clasped behind their backs, saying “maaaaawww” and looking wistfully out to sea.

Day 3 of my Advent Calendar - looking forward to seeing these little origami lanterns in the garden again. I hope the Frits are planning a good show.

Day 2 of my #adventcalendar Happy Highland cattle paddling in the seaweed on Mull. I really enjoyed seeing the island’s cattle wandering about in family groups.

Time to start my fourteenth #adventcalendar and to me it’s obvious that I must start with “my” robin. I first met him in January this year, when this photo was taken, and could see he was BOLD. He soon started coming to my hand for mealworms. He may feature more than once in this advent calendar…

Social media in a nutshell

I have nearly finished planting my winter-spring pots. All filled and arranged (with plenty of bulbs tucked in) to give enough colour/texture/form until the slomo fireworks of spring begin. Next major planting session will be June ‘25

Anyone know the best place to sell 1960s vinyl? Or tips on how to look after them? I don’t have a record player. These were my Dad’s 45s, he worked in Paris in the early 1960s

Good morning, as a small contribution to keeping this place cheerful here’s my robin

Unusual name for a house.

In a Cotswold puddle

An interesting paper for all moth trappers #TeamMoth

MY BOY JUST WON A GRAMMY!

Many would see in this rowan under an ivy lollipop a tree being 'smothered' or even 'strangled'; one that needs 'freeing'. But look through an ecological lens, and something entirely different appears: a rich habitat for a great wealth of living things. Leave ivy be. 🌎

Know how small a Hyacinth petal is? Now you know how very, very small a Chalcid Wasp is! I love macro! #inverts #wasps #becurious

Et maintenant, en français! A mysterious package arrived today and I was very excited to find it contained the French version of my book. So please tell your francophone friends (of course the English version is still available..) #jardin #jardiner #pots #jardinière #potées #potéesfleuries

A stable climate depends on a stable biosphere. The biosphere is made up of complex natural ecosystems, NOT artificial monocultures. Plantation deadzones displace potential ecosystems that could actually be helping stabilise the climate. Thus, they SPEED climate collapse. 🌎

Happy New Year everyone! Here we go…

#adventcalendar day 24. Μerry Christmas and Happy New Year everyone and a virtual bouquet to you all for your companionship in 2023 x

Day 23 of my #adventcalendar. Hold on tight, soon the crowns will be less shy

Designers look at the shape of a live butterfly instead of a dead one challenge 2024 www.emilydamstra.com/please-enoug...