Thursday, March 24, 2011

fish, pruning, gnomes


Posted by PicasaBridge over the moat at Groombridge Place.

They have cut down the condemned trees in The Grove. Today they are pruning the survivors.  Crash- helmeted tree-surgeons climb into the high branches, suitably secured by ropes and straps. The cropped branches meanwhile are chewed into a sawdust  down below by a grinding machine. It is noisy but the noise has a pleasing rural quality. Business in progress.

According to the current issue of Prospect magazine, quoting the Daily Telegraph, garden gnomes were first brought to England from Germany in 1874, by Charles Isham, a spiritualist who hoped  that they would attract real gnomes to his Northamptonshire garden. True? Does it matter?

3 comments:

The Crow said...

What a great photo, Joe! When I first looked at it, I thought I was looking down onto a boat on the surface of the water, then my eyes adjusted (or was it my brain that did?) and I saw the bridge arch and its refelction.

Cool beans!

CC said...

Incredible photo. Thought it might be a print or watercolor at first.

Lucy said...

A kind of date of the Babylonian captivity for garden gnomes?