Stephen Rutt: Nature, Culture, Photography.

The first day of spring is always hazy. Gone is the clarity of late winter's days, and the landscape seems faded, tired. The first bumblebee of the year checks the first flowers: it buzzes past and all is quiet, calm and still again. The warmth is an unusual sensation.

Eventually spring will come, riotously. Blackcaps will burst into song and wildflowers will decorate the places the council can't quite reach. The haze will go too and colour will return to Scotland's hills and the birds, at last. The long Scottish winters slowly starves itself of birds once the Waxwings leave.