A report out recently from the Forestry Commission (See Guardian 31 October 2012) warning of the prevalence of fungal diseases affecting a range of native UK trees, will not come as a complete surprise to anyone walking in the Thornthwaite Forest vicinity.
Last year I was warned that larch forests were at risk from a fungal infection and as a result the Forestry Commission was having to cut down a three acres site above the footpath that leads across the fields from Thornthwaite to Braithwaite.
Now even more serious is the threat to the native English ash tree, which could be decimated if the spread of the ash dieback fungus, appearing last month in East Anglia, is not stopped. The cause appears to be unregulated importing of plants from other countries. The Government needs to act soon to address this serious threat to the countryside. Spread the word if you can.
One positive development to note (See story in Guardian, 29 October 2012) is that a group of academics and developers has just developed an AshTag app for smartphones, which will allow users to send details and photos of suspected examples of the fungus (the leaves of the ash droop and go black) to a central point for the Forestry Commission to investigate. It’s a great example of crowdsourcing to deal with a potentially country wide problem and the app is from today available for download by clicking on the AshTag app website.
Here’s the good news! Just over two hours ago at 9.35 am I saw the red squirrel in the garden. Up on the 
I had heard of the phenomenon in these parts before, but the real thing took me by complete surprise. It would have had SAS trainers (had they been here!) reaching for the superlatives to describe the speed and precision of this evening raid.
Suddenly a whirl of feathers hurtles over the hedge from the road outside and swoops down on this small every day scene of garden life. Before I’ve time to wonder what is happening, the attacker has gone and with it the blackbird. All that is left of a second’s struggle is a pile of black and grey feathers scattered on the grass as the photo shows.
It refers also to the “plucking post”, where they dismember their kill and I remembered the rocky area at the top of the garden where I had seen last week another collection of small bird’s feathers (See Photo opposite). It looks like the sparrowhawk has been here before, while we’ve been busy trying to see the ospreys from the belvedere!
It was about 5:00 pm yesterday when this happened. Poppy (our brown cocker spaniel) was barking away outside the cottage. My dad went cautiously to see what was the matter. A prickly hedgehog was curled up hibernating, intimidated by the noise. 
There’s been plenty of rain around in January but it has only stopped us from going up on the cloud covered high tops. There’s lots else to do!
We’ve been delighted to see that the snowdrops are well out already in the garden and on the lane running up to the cottage. These ‘harbingers of Spring’ as Wordsworth called them – have come really early this year and there are even daffodils appearing in the road to Thornthwaite off the A66.