Fussingø Forest, a mild November Day and a Norwegian Forest Cat.....

The last Days of Autumn. ....

Fussingø, the day before the leaves were all blown away by the storm.

Will we get a record-hot November again in 2015? The temperature yesterday was 16 degrees Celsius and some sleeping butterflies woke up and fluttered around..

Some people still wear short jeans - and on the jogging trip in the evening even summer shorts!
The air is warm both day and night.

The average temperature for a November day is 7 degrees Celsius.

Yellow/Green Beauty

Autumn, especially in poetry, has often been associated with melancholia - the summer has gone and winter is near. Skies are grey and the evenings are dark, but these present warm lovely autumn days of 2015 are not a breeding ground for melancholia, but maybe I should be at the forefront. You'll never know how things look next week!  So here's a little poem about autum from a master.

When a sighing begins
In the violins
Of the autumn-song,
My heart is drowned
In the slow sound
Languorous and long
Pale as with pain,
Breath fails me when
The hours toll deep.
My thoughts recover
The days that are over,
And I weep.

And I go
Where the winds know,
Broken and brief,
To and fro,
As the winds blow
A dead leaf.

 “Chanson d’Automne” by Paul Verlaine, from Poèmes saturniens (1866). Translated by Arthur Symons in Poems (First Collected Edition, 1902)

Some of the forest at Fussingø were laid out as untouched forest since 1992. The section is no longer used for timber or fuel. The trees live as long as they can. The dead trees are important habitats for mammals, birds, insects and other little animals. The forest will gradually turn into a kind of jungle with fallen and dead trees and a variation of trees growing up.

Cyclists in the forest

Lady with dog

old oaks by the road.

The path down to the forest.

The Fussingø district was inhabited since Stone Age. The first safe proof of human settlements is from the bondestenalder which begins 4200 BC. From this period are found many flint axes.  

the buzzard high up in the blue.

A hen in the road, the hens at Fussingø live a dangerous life. The whole flock was up in the traffic road a short minute before I took the photo, but they are very.very fast to get away from the traffic. They disappeared down in the garden below in the flash of a light.  

Fussingø slot in the background.

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See Link:

http://www.fussingoeslot.dk/ 

Fussingø slot is today used for alternate exhibitions of art and arts and crafts. In other buildings are Nature School and Skov- og Naturstyrelsen. Fussingø is owned by the Danish State.

The German family  Skeel von Plessen owned the estate until the end of WWII, where the estate was confiscated by the Danish State as some kind of war compensation.

Fussingø slot is only open during the year in connection to various arrangements etc. The park is
open to the public all year.

Fussingø skov

Stævningsskoven . The coppice forest on the other side of the brook.

The coppice forest (Stævningsskoven)  is the earliest known form of forestry in Denmark It can be traced back to Stone Age in Denmark and further back in other parts of Europe.

The coppice forest began in connection to the peasants' need for fence, fuel, grazing for the livestock, poles, posts etc. The landlords had the right to use the upper section of the forest, while the peasants had to settle for what they could find in the low forest. The coppice forest was a smart solution for the peasants, since this type of forest developed an upper forest, if it was coppiced regularly - and in this way they could keep on their right to use the forest.

When new materials arrived in the 1800s like stone, bricks, stone dikes, earth banks and fences like wire and fossil fuel, the importance of the coppice forest disappeared and the coppice forests were mainly allowed to stay as they were.

an old fragile bridge

the old boat is still there

Well, here comes the ruler of the water mill!

Dear Cat, I see from the facts below that you are adapted to a very cold climate. Don't you feel it is too hot here? Maybe you should have a little hair cut? Oh no, that would be a shame. You are so beautiful, and you know it. Maybe you have adapted to the mild climate too. I hope you have, but you have really got a big beautiful and hot fur coat! Do you like ice cream? 

Last time I met this cat it was so aristocratic that it was not interested in talking to me. Let's see how the pretty cat behaves today.....

Facts: The Norwegian forest cat is a breed of domestic cat native to Northern Europe. This natural breed is adapted to a very cold climate with top coat of glossy long water-shedding hairs, and a wooly undercoat for insulation. It is a big, strong cat, similar to the American Maine Coon  breed, with long legs, a bushy tail and a sturdy body. The breed is very good at climbing, since they have strong claws. 

Hello, are you social or aristocratic today, dear cat?

What a cuddly cat!

Wauw, you've actually got autumn colours. So beautiful.

Bye, bye....I'll go find my good landlady. She's got some food for me. and maybe some ice cream !

Emeraldgreen ferns

See you next year at Fussingø............

The Mill Pond

Long-tailed tit - the afternoon light was fading!!

Nature's beautiful decay. 

Text and photo November 2015: grethe bachmann :

Rold Forest, Lakes and Highwaymen

Poppies on a road bank

Rold skov (Rold forest)  is named after the village of Rold, which lies in the southern outskirt of the forest. Other towns in Rold Skov include Arden, Rebild and Skørping. Rebild National Park (Danish: Rebild Bakker), a Danish national park consisting of heather-covered hills, is located in a part of Rold Skov. Rebild National Park was founded in 1912 by Danish Amercians as a gift to Denmark. The park is known for its 4th of July celebration, the largest held outside the United States. Rold skov is a natura 2000 area and it is both habitat-area and bird protection area.

Store Økssø

Lille Mossø

Store Økssø

Vandnavle/ Marsh Pennywort

Water-Lilies

Mermen?

This day in a sunny weather with a few showers we visited a couple of lakes in Rold skov where we have often found interesting plants and insects. The small lake is Mossø (there is another lake in Denmark called Mossø, it's a big lake near Silkeborg) The big one is Store Økssø, the second largest lake in Rold skov. It is 33 ha with a depth of 8 meter. It is a genuine forest lake, surrounded by forest and moor. The water is clean, but the lake is nutrient-poor and acidic, so the water is brown from the dissolved huminic substances. The lake is owned by the Danish State, so the fishing is free. Bass and eel are common fish here. The lake attracts many birds in the migration period and big flocks of Goldeneyes are seen. If you are lucky you can see the osprey diving after fish. A special thing by Økssø is that there is a possibility for horse-bathing. There is a bridle-path down to the place where the horses can have a bath on a hot day. There are also bathing places for humans! But they are elsewhere!

We were a litte late for the butterflies we usually see in this place in July, but when we got out of the car by the little Mossø, a rare butterfly flew up from a tree. My son got a photo, before it disappeared. It was the Iris (English: Purple Emperor). It is rarely seen in Jutland (more often at Zealand). Here on this place there is no info about it. It was very a very special sight. I couldn't get a phto before it disappeared. Later we went back to watch, and again it flew up from the same tree - and again I couldn't get a photo. Pity!

Well, it was a lovely day out. July has been so rainy and stormy . I hope August and September will be better .

Lingonberry/ Cowberry

At Mossø  were many lingonberries, also called cowberries, and then there were some berries which are not so common, namely the Cornus suecica, Swedish cornel or Bunchberry (in Danish and Swedish called hønsebær = hen-berry).  They flower i May-June - and now in August they have got some fine red berries, which remind about the lingonberries, only they are bigger.

Swedish cornel/ Svensk Hønsebær

Swedish cornel: 
 Swedish cornel grows in moist acidic soil, typically together with cranberry, dwarf birch, bog bilberry, cloudberry, yellow rattle and hare's tail cottongrass. The Swedish cornel is native to cool temperate and subarctic regions of Europe and Asia, and locally in extreme northeastern and nortwestern North America. They are herbaceous perennials, growing to 5-15 cm tall. The flowers are small dark purple in a tight umbel, sourrounded by four white petal-like bracts. The fruit is a red berry.  The Swedish cornel 's habitat is wet woods and rocks. It is nearly circumboreal. In North America the species is found in Alaska, in British Columbia (Canada), and also eastern Canada (Labrador, New Brunswick, Newfoundland, Nova Scotia and Quebec as well as Greenland, but it is absent in the intervening region.
Where Cornus canadensis, a forest species, and Cornus suecica, a bog species, grow near each other in their overlapping ranges in Alaska, Labrador and Greenland, they can hybridize by cross-pollination, producing plants with intermediate characteristics.

Lingonberry/Cowberry

Lingonberry 
The lingonberry or cowberry (Danish: Tyttebær) was known for thousands of years, but it was rarely cultivated. When the Bronze Age grave of the Egtvedgirl was opened many years ago, they found rests of lingonberry wine in the grave. The bush is fine everywhere in the garden, because it covers the ground with a pretty evergreen layer with flowers and berries. The taste of the berries is a little bitter, but they are excellent for pickles. The high content of benzoic makes them very sustainable. The berries contain many vitamins and minerals, and they are said to counteract urinary infections (like cranberry). The seeds are rich in Omega-3.

The lingonberries were actually once a main essential element to keep people healthy in Sweden through the long winters, where they could not get fresh vegetables. A porridge with fat, salten pork and pickled lingonberry was a classical meal in winter. Because of their high content of benzoic it was possible to make the berries durable without cooking them.
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The Highwaymen in Rold 
 Rold Skov lies in Himmerland. It is Denmarks largest
coherent forest complex with 8.600 ha. The forest

was through centuries connected to robbery and violent assaults. Up til the beginning of the 1800s highwaymen were an unpleasant reality for the wayfarers. The big forest lay as a barrier across Himmerland, and the road around it was long and difficult, so people had to use the main tracks through the forest, a piece of the old Hærvejen and another road called Roldvej. Close to Roldvej was the highwaymen's den. There are many exciting storeis about these highwaymen or robbers. A large gang of robbers was uncovered in the 1830s and the trial against them took seven years. Several hundred people were involved in the robberies. One of the convicted was called Bettefanden (Littledevil) and the Jutland author Steen Steensen Blicher wrote a funny short story about him in 1846.

                                                                                                 

















 Røverhulen ( the Highwaymen's den) lies close to one of the old roads Roldvej, which is now a bridle path. It is an impressive hole. According to legend it was a well-hidden resort for the highwaymen . They lived here in shelter of wind and weather and they stretched strings with little bells in the trees, which told them  about the traffic on the road and the eventual loot. The "Robbers of Rold" were stopped  for good -  and so were some highwaymen in another large forest area, Jyske Aas, where another gang was uncovered and punished. From this trial origins the expression "norden for lands lov og ret" ( north of the country's law and order). The forests back then were considered the darkest, darkest Jutland, where it was dangerous to travel.


Today there is a resturant at Rebildvej called Røverhulen and at the same address a smaller place called Bettefanden.




photo 4 August 2012: grethe bachmann

 

Troldeslugten, "The Troll's Ravine", Hald, Viborg district.

Niels Bugges Kro

The trip to Troldeslugten starts at the parking place by Niels Bugges Inn.  The first part behind the inn is the pond where you might see birds like the grey wagtail, the white-throated dipper and the kingfisher, but they don't show their present right now, so we'll continue on the path along the ravine with the crooked trees. Troldeslugten ("the Troll Ravine") is like the whole area - which surrounds the big lake at Hald - created by the ice and the glacial rivers during the laste Ice Age. Most trees here are up till 300 years old beech trees. The place looks like some kind of Nordic jungle, but it is a natural forest and as such an "untouched forest" = the forest takes care of itslef. In the bottom of the ravine are several springs, which feeds the pond at Niels Bugges Inn.


The path is steep in some places, and the trees are very crooked, leaning across our heads.  It must be a spooky place at night, but here in the sunlight with the light green leaves of May it looks very friendly.
   

On the bank was a violet with the Danish name Krat-viol. English name = Common Dog violet also called Wood violet, a perennial herb of woodland, grassland and hedge banks.Viola riviniana was voted the County flower of Lincolnshire in 2002. It is the food plant of several Fritillary butterflies.

A very big fungus, one of those which are as hard as stone. I think it is called a fomes fomentarius when I compare with other photos. Known as the tinder fungus, hook fungus etc. tghe species sypically live on trees long after they have died, they change from a parstie to a decomposer. Nature is really amazing!
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F. fomentarius was used as the main ingredient of amadou, a material used primarily as tinder, but also used to make clothing and other items. The 5,000-year-old Ötzi the Iceman carried four pieces of F. fomentarius, concluded to be for use as tinder. It also has medicinal and other uses. The species is both a pest and useful in timber production.

 And here is a fine little Aurora butterfly. The English name is Orange tip. and it is dressed in white with a pretty orange colour.  The Aurora is usually very restless at this time of the year, but this one was sitting quietly in the grass, maybe taking a little warmth from the sparse sunshine.  The weather is cold and there aren't many butterflies out in these days. Some Large White butterflies were bathing in the sunbeams  in the shelter of dried beech leaves from last year.   

photo Hald, Troldeslugten May 2012: grethe bachmann