Interloper barley

Nature is tenacious. The drive to grow, thrive and multiply is central to all living things. In an area of intensive agriculture such as the Fens it is harder than elsewhere for plants and animals to achieve this biological imperative.Where farmers grow wheat a regime of pesticides and herbicides aims to ensure that only the wanted crop grows. Consequently the much-liked poppies that traditionally accompany wheat are few and far between. However, the other day I came across three ears of barley in a green field of wheat. How did they get there? Were they a survival from a previous crop? Is it wild barley? Would they continue to grow and be harvested with the surrounding crop? I'll probably never know, but it was good to see these three stems marring the perfection of the pampered wheat.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Olympus OMD E-M10

River Welland at Deeping St James

I've photographed this landscape view a few times because it holds some of the features that I most associate with the lowlands and the Fens - a church spire rising above the roofs of the surrounding village, willow trees by the riverside, and the slowly moving river itself, meandering through the fields and settlements, raised banks protecting the surrounding areas from its overflow.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Sony DSC-RX100

Frosty Fenland landscape

Winter trees make good photographic subjects. They give landscapes detail and their skeletal silhouettes offer a stark beauty. On a frosty winter day the contrast between black branches and the overcast sky and whitened ground is stronger still. In the photograph the mist is enhancing this effect further. The trees visible above are managing to hang on in an intensively farmed area because they have grown either on the side of a drainage ditch or next to a farm building and so are are no impediment to the vehicles that cultivate the land and harvest the crops.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Olympus OMD E-M10

Fenland smallholding

The Fens used to be a land of small, independent farmers and smallholders, each earning a living from the fertile soil of this drained, lowland area. However, mechanisation and the pressure for cheap food led to consolidation, bigger farms and contractors working the land. Smallholders still exist, but in much reduced numbers, often as hobbyists. This old smallholding appears to have been recently sold. I photographed it on a frosty morning as dark clouds moving in from the west began to obscure the sun and turn the day darker than was promised.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Olympus OMD E-M10