Of Myths and Moors
@cherylquine.bsky.social
Hedgerow scavenger, wildflower reciter, animal protector, pen wielder, paint splatterer, word wrangler, folklore teller, liminal-space dweller. Usually found where the corvids are.
It’s been a year of holding on
A liminal time of loss, long silences. But here, the oaks remind me
Growth begins in surrender. Too much to carry? Then let it fall.
#mastyear
A liminal time of loss, long silences. But here, the oaks remind me
Growth begins in surrender. Too much to carry? Then let it fall.
#mastyear
October 12, 2025 at 3:05 PM
It’s been a year of holding on
A liminal time of loss, long silences. But here, the oaks remind me
Growth begins in surrender. Too much to carry? Then let it fall.
#mastyear
A liminal time of loss, long silences. But here, the oaks remind me
Growth begins in surrender. Too much to carry? Then let it fall.
#mastyear
The sun reaches me in fragments peering between birch-boughs to find the rest of me. Wild marjoram hums with insect-thrum, each mound alive with shimmer and stir. Above, swallows cleave the air. They reap the sky, gathering the fleeting harvest of summer; joy itself made feather and flight. #summer
August 17, 2025 at 6:03 PM
The sun reaches me in fragments peering between birch-boughs to find the rest of me. Wild marjoram hums with insect-thrum, each mound alive with shimmer and stir. Above, swallows cleave the air. They reap the sky, gathering the fleeting harvest of summer; joy itself made feather and flight. #summer
High Leys - Hay meadows: fields that have fed centuries, stitched with wildflowers, their roots remembering what we’ve forgotten. Not just pasture, but archive. Not just grass, but living history sung in pollen and bees.
Since the 1930s, Britain has lost 97% of its hay meadows.
#RewildBritain
Since the 1930s, Britain has lost 97% of its hay meadows.
#RewildBritain
August 14, 2025 at 2:35 PM
High Leys - Hay meadows: fields that have fed centuries, stitched with wildflowers, their roots remembering what we’ve forgotten. Not just pasture, but archive. Not just grass, but living history sung in pollen and bees.
Since the 1930s, Britain has lost 97% of its hay meadows.
#RewildBritain
Since the 1930s, Britain has lost 97% of its hay meadows.
#RewildBritain
A portent of doom, bearer of wisdom or adorable fluffball? This beautiful young tawny spent a few minutes with me yesterday morning. #ukwildlife #tawnyowl #owl #athena
#minerva #blodeuwedd
#minerva #blodeuwedd
July 5, 2025 at 8:24 AM
A portent of doom, bearer of wisdom or adorable fluffball? This beautiful young tawny spent a few minutes with me yesterday morning. #ukwildlife #tawnyowl #owl #athena
#minerva #blodeuwedd
#minerva #blodeuwedd
July 3, 2025 at 10:47 PM
Birds being birds. No filters, just feathers - daily snapshots from my trailcam. #fasterthanaspeedingbullfinch #birds #gardenbirds
July 2, 2025 at 12:05 AM
Birds being birds. No filters, just feathers - daily snapshots from my trailcam. #fasterthanaspeedingbullfinch #birds #gardenbirds
Close up of a collagraph plate used for hand printing. It’s incredible that this is made from cardboard, wood glue, shellac and a bit of insulation tape. After several inkings, the plate takes on a wood-like patina. The plates become art in their own right. #collagraph #handprinted #art #curlew #ink
July 1, 2025 at 9:15 AM
Close up of a collagraph plate used for hand printing. It’s incredible that this is made from cardboard, wood glue, shellac and a bit of insulation tape. After several inkings, the plate takes on a wood-like patina. The plates become art in their own right. #collagraph #handprinted #art #curlew #ink
Totting up my bird records for this year and we’re up to 58 species around the house so far. A favourite of which is the curlew which is paid homage to in a collagraph print I made recently. #handprinted #collagraph #curlew #birds #twitcher
June 30, 2025 at 10:45 PM
Totting up my bird records for this year and we’re up to 58 species around the house so far. A favourite of which is the curlew which is paid homage to in a collagraph print I made recently. #handprinted #collagraph #curlew #birds #twitcher
A much needed bit of magic arrived this weekend. Wild Folk is a collection of fables created by Jackie Morris and Tamsin Abbott. Visually stunning whilst also conjuring up beauty in the mind’s eye. @tamsintheshed.bsky.social #wildfolk #magic #spell #boundlesspublishing #fable #sevenfablesdulverton
June 30, 2025 at 12:44 AM
A much needed bit of magic arrived this weekend. Wild Folk is a collection of fables created by Jackie Morris and Tamsin Abbott. Visually stunning whilst also conjuring up beauty in the mind’s eye. @tamsintheshed.bsky.social #wildfolk #magic #spell #boundlesspublishing #fable #sevenfablesdulverton
In Cumbria, my visitor is known as an urchin. Prior to the enclosures act, they were called this more widely due to their resemblance to sea urchins. Urchins not being a common part of the UK diet, it is more likely that it stems from an older PIE root for ‘bristle’. #hedgehog #urchin #etymology
June 2, 2025 at 8:50 PM
In Cumbria, my visitor is known as an urchin. Prior to the enclosures act, they were called this more widely due to their resemblance to sea urchins. Urchins not being a common part of the UK diet, it is more likely that it stems from an older PIE root for ‘bristle’. #hedgehog #urchin #etymology
Listen to bats (soprano pipistrelles) in real time thanks to the echo meter I was using at the same time I filmed them. Make sure your sound is on.
June 1, 2025 at 10:39 PM
Listen to bats (soprano pipistrelles) in real time thanks to the echo meter I was using at the same time I filmed them. Make sure your sound is on.
Mystery ‘Easter’ cross-creator update. Turns out it is field mice who created the Easter homage. It is a behaviour known as caching. Usually they take food and hide it for later. I can only assume as there is too much food to take and hide that they are instead bringing things to hide it for later.
May 4, 2025 at 9:21 PM
Mystery ‘Easter’ cross-creator update. Turns out it is field mice who created the Easter homage. It is a behaviour known as caching. Usually they take food and hide it for later. I can only assume as there is too much food to take and hide that they are instead bringing things to hide it for later.
The sweetest game of chase you ever did see. I swear half way through the clip, when one mouse takes a snack break, the other taps it on the tail to get it to come back and play. 😍
May 4, 2025 at 7:24 PM
The sweetest game of chase you ever did see. I swear half way through the clip, when one mouse takes a snack break, the other taps it on the tail to get it to come back and play. 😍
Mary had a little lamb (or two) who showed up late on Friday night wanting baa & baa... except I’m not Mary! (Part 1)
April 27, 2025 at 11:41 PM
Mary had a little lamb (or two) who showed up late on Friday night wanting baa & baa... except I’m not Mary! (Part 1)
An Easter Monday mystery.
An Easter ‘gift’ was waiting for me in the greenhouse this morning - a bowl I put seed in for the mice and voles had been fashioned into a little nest of moss and feathers complete with a wooden cross on top!!! I’ve left my trail cam on tonight to see what happens next.
An Easter ‘gift’ was waiting for me in the greenhouse this morning - a bowl I put seed in for the mice and voles had been fashioned into a little nest of moss and feathers complete with a wooden cross on top!!! I’ve left my trail cam on tonight to see what happens next.
April 21, 2025 at 9:28 PM
An Easter Monday mystery.
An Easter ‘gift’ was waiting for me in the greenhouse this morning - a bowl I put seed in for the mice and voles had been fashioned into a little nest of moss and feathers complete with a wooden cross on top!!! I’ve left my trail cam on tonight to see what happens next.
An Easter ‘gift’ was waiting for me in the greenhouse this morning - a bowl I put seed in for the mice and voles had been fashioned into a little nest of moss and feathers complete with a wooden cross on top!!! I’ve left my trail cam on tonight to see what happens next.
Bubble bubble, boil and… stir that cauldron to conjure up stunning shades using natural dyes and fabrics. There was ‘no eye of newt’ (mustard seed) or ‘toe of frog’ (buttercup) but there was plenty of: weld, buckthorn, cochineal, indigo and brazil wood. #colour #naturaldye #environment #shakespeare
February 16, 2025 at 1:15 AM
Bubble bubble, boil and… stir that cauldron to conjure up stunning shades using natural dyes and fabrics. There was ‘no eye of newt’ (mustard seed) or ‘toe of frog’ (buttercup) but there was plenty of: weld, buckthorn, cochineal, indigo and brazil wood. #colour #naturaldye #environment #shakespeare
Driven down the valley by the advancing snow clouds, flocks of redwing, fieldfare and starlings descended on the last of the visible grass to feed this afternoon. #redwing #fieldfare #starling #cumbria
January 5, 2025 at 10:01 PM
Driven down the valley by the advancing snow clouds, flocks of redwing, fieldfare and starlings descended on the last of the visible grass to feed this afternoon. #redwing #fieldfare #starling #cumbria
I am fortunate to live in an area with very dark skies which revealed tonight a relatively rare atmospheric phenomenon. It’s known as a SAR- sub auroral red arc. #SAR #darkskies #Cumbria
January 1, 2025 at 11:03 PM
I am fortunate to live in an area with very dark skies which revealed tonight a relatively rare atmospheric phenomenon. It’s known as a SAR- sub auroral red arc. #SAR #darkskies #Cumbria
There’s a spectacular aurora tonight… under those clouds. Hope the sky is clear for some of you. #aurora #northernlights #cumbria #newyearsday25
January 1, 2025 at 6:32 PM
There’s a spectacular aurora tonight… under those clouds. Hope the sky is clear for some of you. #aurora #northernlights #cumbria #newyearsday25
The TDIR readalong is reaching its peak. Chapter 10 sees Will discover the last of the signs. An unnamed king emerges from the earth on a funereal longship guarding it alongside the rest of his treasure. #tdir #thedarkisrising #fantasy
December 29, 2024 at 7:00 PM
The TDIR readalong is reaching its peak. Chapter 10 sees Will discover the last of the signs. An unnamed king emerges from the earth on a funereal longship guarding it alongside the rest of his treasure. #tdir #thedarkisrising #fantasy
Fifty-one years since its publication, Susan Cooper’s work continues to enchant those whose spell its words were cast upon both as children and adults. #thedarkisrising #tdir #fantasy #chikdrensliterature #kidslit
December 29, 2024 at 12:57 AM
Fifty-one years since its publication, Susan Cooper’s work continues to enchant those whose spell its words were cast upon both as children and adults. #thedarkisrising #tdir #fantasy #chikdrensliterature #kidslit
#StStephensDay: Today’s walk was accompanied by a wren raucously chattering from the hedgerow. Frazer wrote of a symbolical rite where the 26th saw the parading of a hedge king caught the day prior. A form of sympathetic magic, it represented the shifting liminal period between winter/spring.
December 26, 2024 at 11:04 PM
#StStephensDay: Today’s walk was accompanied by a wren raucously chattering from the hedgerow. Frazer wrote of a symbolical rite where the 26th saw the parading of a hedge king caught the day prior. A form of sympathetic magic, it represented the shifting liminal period between winter/spring.
Christmas Eve - The tree of knowledge - ‘Wood is the sign of learning.’ The Dark is Rising #tdir #thedarkisrising
December 24, 2024 at 12:46 AM
Christmas Eve - The tree of knowledge - ‘Wood is the sign of learning.’ The Dark is Rising #tdir #thedarkisrising
Old Way Lane - The power of words. Ch4 The Dark is Rising #tdir #thedarkisrising
December 24, 2024 at 12:28 AM
Old Way Lane - The power of words. Ch4 The Dark is Rising #tdir #thedarkisrising