Northernlights

Nice breeze with blue skies now a fine evening.

A few decades ago I registered the farm house swift colony as its old eaves are ideal for their nests. Their screaming round and round high above the house in the evening is a real sign of high summer.They will be gone again in about a fortnight and for me summer is nearly over.at that point.Although insect numbers are still low at least this has been a warmer summer to allow these birds to feed their young most days without sheltering from rain. Even saw a pheasant with fully fledged young this morning.At least the badgers haven"t eaten all the eggs!!Phone line is sagging again this morning with about 40 swallows etc all sitting on it making a real dawn chorus.

About an hour ago got ends of hay field baled up ready to wrap in plastic tomorrow morning finished minutes before a cloud burst with mini rivers running down the road only to return to farmhouse which was bone dry just half a mile away. Seriously strange weather. Birds still at feeder, insect life still scarse but swallows,swifts and housemartins have had huge broods and literally have hundreds of young filling the sky above the farm just now.

Grumpy old farmer here too turned hay all day yesterday with expectation of a dry day today instead just the same rain here too.Will probably wrap some in plastic(more expensive) if it dries up later just to preserve some. Best thing to take your mind off hay is to just have a look at the neeps which are reaching for the sky with all this lovely damp.

A very dreich day and damp.Thick fog occasionally so dark it looked like November out there and was probbaly as cool at 14c

I wonder with a sleepy sun possibly helping to cause a southerly tracking jetstream a cooler autumn and winter are on their way. There are even stubble fields from early cut winter barley with local geese on them picking up the spilt grain. Ground is also very dry and grass is quite yellow/brown looking in spite of recent rain.

A few sunny intervals today followed by a fine evening. Cleaning old tractor ready for local show next weekend. Neeps charging on. Photos of the last three weeks growth. These turnips are still two weeks ahead of normal and the whole countryside has the look of August with ripening crops.Even young Mr Northernlights said he had to remind himself today it was still July. I wonder if we will see the first snow on the hills at the end of September or even sooner?

A bit cloudy but sunny intervels and a fresh south wind. Drying up fast again at 17.5c

Coud rolled in from the east about 6.00pm so very dark and now a cooler 16c

Yes I see they are quoting 28000 strikes on the home page there were 44000 strikes overnight last year from that storm.Still very hot and windy here currently 24c

Very stuffy night not sleeping. Hay all in under cover by 1.00am this morning. Just thinking is history going to repeat itself a year ago today we had big thunderstoms up here .

Fabulous hay day blue skies, fresh sea breeze and 23c HOT Dog Wilting neeps

Fabulous hot breezy day the batch of hay cut a few days ago has almost made in a day. Crop ripening up too.

Supposed to be a dry day here but a shower appeared out of nowhere in thre last half hour and soaked me and the dog .Not good for haymaking but great for neeps with their leaves nearly touching across the rows..Currently 13c.

Although not perfect haymaking weather recently there have always been dryish perods between the spells of rain and the warmth and sun of the late spring and early summer have pushed on crop growth which is now about two weeks ahead of normal. In fact today I am cultivating turnips which should meet across the rows next week long before the early August norm. Just hope the hints of more sustained dry spells come off for haymaking.

A break in the weather after a wet drizzly morning gave a view of the aircraft carrier. Turnip photos one week apart Currently 16c

Would the thunder belt be moving north as in my area the frequency of storms has increased dramatically since I was a child in the sixties culminating in last summers spectacular storms of 19th-20th of July.(44000 cloud to ground strikes overnight in the north of Scotland and 750000 phones knocked out) I lived in Hertfordshire until I was 7 and always remember the big storms in the summer but after moving to Scotland in the early sixties I almost forgot what thunder was in the summer. I think too it was last summer that thunderstorms were recorded north of the Arctic Circle.

Just watching the cruise liners passing the Queen Elizabeth and they just dwarf her they must be about twice the size.

Wet morning followed by a humid dull afternoon.Countryside has the look of early August about it tired and not fresh green green.Spring barley is even begining to ripen.Notice a lot of bracken fronds in the woodslook stunted and sllightly brown,drought earlier? A lot of bushes and trees even holly have brown leaves too. As cloud cleared could see new aircraft carrier Queen Elizabeth in the Firth. Currently 21c

Shower started about .15 minutes ago and has since become torrential.Currently 13c

Strawberries and neeps looking goodl

Very nice day here in spite of a strong wind.Rain of the last few days rapidly disappearing from surface of ground. Crops have done another growth spurt. Currently 18c.

I was at a meeting in Inverness on Tuesday night and met a couple of farmers from Tain and the Black Isle who said it had rained most of the day on Tuesday whereas we had just spits and a strong drying wind in the rain shadow of the Cairngorms.

Am I the only one who is happy with the rain as after a week of drying winds the ground was getting very dry again.The turnip field is next to the farmhouse so when I looked out this morning the turnips were smiling in the rain. Speaking to a neighbour today who backed up my dry story as he said its been an easy year so far to keep on top of the weeds in the garden. Cool though at 10c

M Mrs Northernlights has just said she advises against publishing my farm diary on here as its just possible you might all lose the will to live. Dull and misty here and currently 12c