Tag: Clayhanger

March 31st – At Clayhanger Bridge on the canal near Brownhills, there’s a sluice that allows the waterway to be drained into local sewers if necessary. I noticed today that it had temporary fencing around it, and that micropiles – stainless steel rods inside sleeve tubes and packed out with expanding foam – had been fitted around the sluice and along the adjoining canal bank.

This is clearly a stabilisation job, and I’m intrigued as there’s not real outward sign of such a thing being necessary – except for the fact that I suspect the bank and culvert may be subject to destructive erosion if used, which these piles may relieve.

The tops currently stood proud will be chopped off at ground level later.

Meanwhile, closer to Catshill Junction, the embankment has been falling away into the canal for over a year, and nothing has been done despite drawing it to the attention of the Canal & River Trust.

Most peculiar.

March 31st – A dreadful day to commute, although you’d never tell from the photos. It was very, very windy all day, with strong gusts that felt very threatening. I cycled to and from work in sun, overcast grey, rain and hail. The weather didn’t stay the same for five minutes. Talk about four seasons in one day.

Still, the young heron by the canal at Clayhanger was an unexpected treat. Hopefully, the wind will die down tomorrow and the weather may settle a little.

March 29th – It was just an awfully uninspiring day. There were very few people about. The wildlife seemed to be hiding. Everything looked drab. In a vain search for deer I hopped onto clay hanger Common, which was saturated, like a marsh. Even the pigeons were giving it a miss.

It does look wonderfully green, though.

March 25th – As it happened, I never got to a place where the sunset was that good today, which was probably just as well as I was reduced to the phone camera with the main one flat. As I rode down the canal to central Brownhills, I saw a large dog fox run up the bank onto Clayhanger Common. Grabbing the phone, I crested the bank looking for a fox picture to go with yesterday’s heron.

Sadly, he disappeared into the thicket. 

The sky wasn’t too bad though, so I took a quick picture, and headed home.

March 6th – And elsewhere too, on the canal, signs of spring. At Walsall Wood bridge, butties are being loaded from a temporary, rough wharf from a derelict factory yard, ready to supply earth to a worksite near Catshill Junction. Growing from the brickwork canalside nearby, beautiful coltsfoot flowers in abundance, almost hidden from view.

At the new pond in Clayhanger, the scrub and copse still looks barren, but there’s a sense of anticipation, almost as if nature is waiting for the starting gun.

March 3rd – I was quite lucky with this, too; also handheld. The moon was my companion tonight as I rode through Sheffield and Walsall Wood, I noticed how bright it was. I love how if you can photograph it, detail you can’t see with the naked eye becomes evident.

All those miles of nothing between me and the moon. And yet, man has been there, and landed on that glowing ball. 

Such a wonderful, enchanting thought.

March 3rd – Cold, windy. Horrid journeys to work, fast and fun journeys back. It seems we’re in for a blustery spring, but it was light nearly all the way home tonight – another week, and I might get home in the light.

Ah, blessed light.

I’ve been fiddling with the new camera – astoundingly to me, these shots were all handheld (I don’t have steady hands). This one seems more sensitive, if that’s the word, and seems to select a faster shutter in lower light than previous models. I’m liking it a lot.

It was a fair sunset tonight, but clear, and harsh. I was glad to get in.

February 1st – Crikey, are we a 12th through the year already? How did that happen?

I passed through Ryders Mere in the morning, and expected it to be busy with twitchers for the latest rarity – a Great Northern Diver has been here for a few weeks now – but curiously, I was alone. This place is lovely, but I still find it a little barren. 20 years ago this was an opencast, and now, a peaceful haven for wildfowl.

One day, I might bump into the man of the marsh himself, Chaz Mason. That would be lovely. In the meantime, the gulls and grebes carried on as normal.

January 30th – These images don’t look much, but click on them and take a look at larger versions. Fifteen second exposures over the canal to the east at Clayhanger, one catches orion in the sky beautifully.

These were an experiment I didn’t expect much from. They worked better than I ever hoped.

January 30th – A long day. Out early, the commute was odd. I wrapped up for very cold, a thin layer of snow still on the ground here. But as I got to Rushall, the air felt warmer and there was less and less snow. In Walsall, hardly any sign at all. I was sweating. I guess I rode over a weather front. It’s not every day you do that.

On the way back that evening, it was chilly in Walsall and warmer as I got closer to home. The snow had melted during the day, and the sky was clear. With a little moonlight and long exposure, Clayhanger Bridge looked fine in the night.

Strange weather, lately.