We may be closing in upon mid winter's day but that hasn't prevented us from enjoying a cloudless day. In the back garden the temperature overnight only dropped to zero but as we climbed along the road to Backies, with the intention of visiting the croft in search of eggs, there was black ice on the road and....
....a hard frost along the path through the bracken, from which....
....a wren roundly cursed us for disturbing the tranquility of his morning.
In several of the frost pockets along the way we found this unusual phenomenon which we came across last winter for the first time - hair ice, otherwise known as ice beard or ice wool. It forms on damp nights when the temperature drops to zero, the thin strands of a fungus acting as the core upon which the ice crystallises.
It was a pleasant walk to the croft and then home through the forestry but there were no eggs available. We found the hens a little further along the road, huddled against a gate as if they were on strike and picketing it.
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