In the relative cool of evening I pick yet more blueberries and blackcurrants from unusually heavily laden bushes in the fruit cage. The top net is not yet replaced after the snow damage before Christmas but, amazingly, there is no bird or squirrel predation. A blackbird continues to sing in the hedge and a young robin flits beside me, in search of insects. Across the lane, silence is broken as our neighbouring farmer, with telescopic handler, dextrously manoeuvres big round bales from the long trailer on to the spinning wrapper, before piling up the black-plastic-covered haylage in readiness for winter.
Late sun still lights the north‑facing slope opposite, where pale brown suckler cows, their calves and a bull spread across the pasture. Part of the main herd of around 100 pedigree South Devon cows, this group of 20 cows and calves at foot are rotated between the fields, and in our view throughout the summer months. Their long days of grazing are interspersed with regular lie‑downs, all gathered around the bull as they chew the cud.
Grass growth in this predominantly pastoral parish benefited from substantial rain in early June, when narrow lanes became streams and deep puddles formed along New Road, between former mills in the Cotehele Valley. The subsequent hot, dry days involved a frenzy of cutting, spreading, drying and rowing-up of grass for the baling of valued fodder. Showers and misty damp mornings have tempered midsummer’s hot, dry weather; now, cut fields are green again, some with swaths of fragrant white clover. Maize (to be cut and ensiled in early autumn) is more than head high and has already formed tassels. Here we have twice as much growth as upcountry (according to our farmer friend with relatives in the drier Midlands).
Among the dusty hedgerow ferns, seeding hogweed, pink hemp agrimony and valerian are entwined in bedstraw, honeysuckle and bramble. Gatekeeper and dark ringlet butterflies spiral up from tangled grasses in the orchard and, with peacock, admiral, comma, various fritillaries and a rare hummingbird hawkmoth, seek out the marjoram and buddleia in this overgrown garden. Cherry stones surround the tall Burcombe tree, and fox faeces indicate a night-time trampler, reaching for ripening clusters of Discovery apples.