Grass

I like grass, but not the sort of grass the British are so obsessed with - lawn grass.

Golspie is blessed with large areas of open space. In fact, the outdoor facilities here, for a small town, are exceptionally good. Most of the large green area in the middle distance in this picture is games field, with goalposts for rugby and hockey.

I quite understand the Council mowing the pitches so that people can enjoy their sports but the adjacent green area, just on the far side of the road from the pitches, is....

 ....open green space which doesn't seem to have any real purpose. The occasional dog walker crosses it; sometimes one of the local youths rides a motorbike round it; once, a couple of young people came out and kicked a football around; otherwise it's left to nature - even more so when the Council was recently short-staffed, when the field was left to grow and, suddenly, began to look a little interesting. We even had hopes that it might be allowed to become meadow, to the benefit of wildlife. But....

....the staffing problems must have eased as a man came with a motor mower and, driving round and round with a rapt smile on his face, reduced the budding meadow to boring lawn again. At least the rooks and jawdaws, which spend large amounts of time - when they're not harassing us - in digging for worms and leatherjackets, seemed pleased - except this rather bedraggled rook which was also being harassed, by its progeny.

Last night a roe deer ventured onto the field. It crossed from the woodland on the A9 side towards the small road, and then ran back, but stopped for a time to browse on some leaves. Obviously it doesn't think much of the lawn either.