New buds, and happy horses

Bitterly cold. Walked around the back of the hill avoid the coastal wind chill.  Trees and bushes crusted with lichen, moss on lichen, lichen on lichen. But there were leaf buds on this elder.

[The foraging craze  is leading to people to call it elderflower or elderberry tree. Hmm, will that lead to oaks being referred to as acorn trees I wonder?]

On the way back we saw that the coastal ponies have been taken into a field and given fodder.

Gilbert White's diary, February 11, 1780
Eruptive fevers and sore throats lurk about the parish: some die of this disorder.