Stag

Dallam Park, Milnthorpe, Cumbria

It was a choice between this stag-headed ash tree or fallow deer stags in Dallam Park.

The only sun I saw today is hidden behind the tree, and the only blue sky is in the top right corner. A crisp, frosty morning that was nevertheless hazy until the sun made its brief showing.

I love this old ash tree in the deer park. There are always jackdaws in the hollowed out trunk - suggesting the sort of habitat these birds would normally nest in were it not for all the unused chimneys around (see last Friday's blip). In our manicured English woods and landscapes, trees like this are usually tidied up, but here in Dallam this old tree is allowed to carry on with its clusters of new twigs providing a small leaf area in spring and summer.

Note the lines in the grass are ridge and furrow - possibly remnants of ploughing many years ago.

I had a little time this morning before heading to the Lancaster Infirmary for the latest appointment to look at the mystery lump on my foot. The considered opinion remains that it is a ganglion, but the surgeon has a lingering doubt because of its unusual location. So, the next step is to get an MRI scan - never had one of those before, so should be an interesting new experience. The surgeon, being a surgeon, is all for excising it. I'm not so sure. I don't particularly fancy a few weeks unable to drive and walk about: if nothing else, it would play havoc with my blipping activity. Anyway, we won't have to make a decision for a few weeks now until we have the results of the scan.

Thank you for all the stars, comments and hearts for yesterday's Gulls at Sunset blip. One or two people remarked on the linear nature of the reflection. I'm not sure what the explanation is, but you can see the same phenomenon in the two other Sandside sunset blips I have posted in the last week. There wasn't a sniff of a sunset this evening.