Fay Young

@fayyoung.bsky.social

317 Followers 189 Following

Writer, editor, old style journalist and newish media collaborator. Woodland gardener, co-editor Sceptical Scot, podcaster Walking Heads. Enjoy music, poetry, food, good company

A child’s orange tractor protrudes through a mud bank in the woods at Pond Cottage Garden Made me think of The Garage in Glasgow’s Sauchiehall Street
Our 'smart' mink trap (looking a little like a houseboat) is programmed to text when a mink is trapped.
A small white sign on a red wall. The black text says No Ball Games
‘Black’ flowered (dark red really) Geranium phaeum The picture was taken before they started going to seed. This morning I saw a beautiful pair of bullfinches feeding on a prolific crop of seed - still a few flowers left
Picture shows guitarist Morgan Szymanski and artist/musician Tommy Perman (@surfacepressure.bsky.social - and my son btw) on a bench. Their debut at Ronnie Scott’s Upstairs is 29 June
Golden light on the plants reflected in the dark water on the large pond surrounded by tall green trees Photo of Pond Cottage woodland by Fay Young The mink has just appeared in the last ten days - we hadn’t seen mink here for more than 20 years
Sun and shade - I sheltered from the afternoon heat beneath giant leaves of Gunnera. Huge green leaves provided welcome shade, the sun making dramatic patterns through the framework of the leaf highlighted against a bright blue sky. Pond Cottage garden
Storyteller Caroline Carmichael holds a young girl spellbound with the story of stone soup - a tale discovering generosity and community spirit. And how to make a tasty soup
Greens and starry white flowers. A spread of wild garlic sloping down to the pond. Picture by Arngask Home Farm’s Eilidh on their foraging trip to Pond Cottage
A sweep of wild garlic beneath fresh green beech trees Photo Eilidh Arngask Home Farm
Poster of front cover of James Hutton biography James Hutton Genius of time by Ray Perman. I’m biased, he’s my husband, and a great storyteller with a very human story to tell
Cover of The Wrath to Come by Sarah Churchwell
Found in my desk, yellow and blue cards from National Theatre of Scotland The Great Yes, No, Don’t Know Five Minute Theatre Show souvenirs from 2014 - the year the great political disruption began
A root bound purple sage, ready for transplanting
First Meconopsis opens at Pond Cottage
A smiling portrait of David Gow on the front page of the programme of events lovingly curated by Gayle Gow in celebration of the extraordinary full life of her husband: David Gow 7 April 1945 - 3 November 2025 ‘A noble life in the public interest’ The Caledonian Hall at Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh was full of family, friends, and colleagues from near and far.
It's sunset, time to close down for the night, but one little wood anemone keeps an eye open. Pond Cottage woodland picture Fay Young
Cover of Nuclear Weapons: An International History by David Holloway, Emeritis Professor of international history, Stanford University. The cover shows atomic bomb cloud on Bikini Atoll 1946. David is an authority on the history of nuclear weapons (other books include Stalin and The Bomb). We’re proud to be old friends since Arlene and David lived in Edinburgh 50 years ago.
Trees waving wildly in the wild wind at the end of March at Pond Cottage
No Kings signs held high in protests across the US
Weekend of Mistakes sign in Hay Castle, Hay on Wye
A beautifully line path through Camley Nature Reserve, London Wildlife Trust wild space thriving beside busy Regents Canal
A sign welcoming us to the Weekend of Mistakes at Hay on Wye
A grimacing Farage in a plasticine portrait by Wilfred Wood in FT Magazine Illustrating interview with Henry Mance See tweet for gift link
A bright splash of miniature dancing daffodils Narcissus ‘Jetfire’ weaving and spinning in high winds. March at Pond Cottage
Laptop, book, glass of water, specs - Ray Perman’s essentials for last night’s talk about James Hutton, Genius of (deep) time to Dunbar History Society
The spiral stairs to the Wall of Death viewing platform at The Revelator in Glasgow Created by Stephen Skynkr
A welcome burst of cheerful yellow. Miniature narcissi are springing through leaf litter in our shelter belt at Pond Cottage. In the background there's still a glint of snowdrops and a pile of larch wood full of cones from last year's storms. It looks a bit untidy but birds love to rummage and shelter in it. Happy International Women's Day
A constant flood of brown water flowing through our pond and woodland, weakening woodland roots destroying wildlife habitat
A glorious sunset for the first time after 40 days of relentless rain over pond cottage, photo Fay Young
Art work by Rae-Yen Song for A Brisk Walk produced by Walking Heads in Collaboration with Architecture and Design Scotland and published on the Guidigo app platform. Free to download https://www.guidigo.com//Tour/Glasgow/United%20Kingdom/A-Brisk-Walk-Buildings-at-Risk/JyoEGAu5jsQ
A detail from the derelict A listed building, Lion Chambers, on Glasgow's Hope Street. The sculpture on the ten story tall, narrow, early concrete building shows a judge looking south down Hope Street. What hope of rescue for the building that has been empty since 2010? You can hear more on the audio tour A Brisk Walk, Derelict Buildings in Glasgow on Guidigo https://www.guidigo.com/Web/A-Brisk-Walk-Buildings-at-Risk/JyoEGAu5jsQ/Stop/4/Lion-Chambers#
Desperate Dan strides along Dundee High Street, I chose it to illustrate Sceptical Scot's latest feature on urban decay by Charlie Ellis, it seems to defy James Melville's description of a 'once glorious city full of decay' Sculpture by Tony and Susie Morrow
Tracks of red squirrels in the snow at Pond Cottage today
The front cover of Royal Horticultural Society magazine in December 2025 offering 25 lessons from 2025 - a treasure trove of good practical information about what has suffered or thrived during a tough year of floods and droughts. And what we can do with the knowledge
This letter is from Scottish social services announcing my 2025 winter fuel payment of £101.70 - with no assessment of my needs or assets. Nice if the national budget was not under such pressure. I wonder what it costs to provide this handout to relatively comfortable pensioners who can afford their heating bills. In fact UK government foots the bill
Brown water with polluting runoff flooding our wildlife pond.
A detail from Le Passe-Muraille, by sculptor Jean Marais in tribute to Marcel Aymé and his story The Man who Walked through Walls It's the featured image for John McLaren's Sceptical Scot review of UK Budget 2025, "such a disappointment, because it did nothing at a time when so much needs to be done". https://sceptical.scot/2025/12/uk-budget-2025-get-real-the-world-has-changed/ Photo: Fay Young
The larch tree, one of three planted by us almost 30 years ago, is a favourite play park for ‘our’ red squirrels. A taller larch was split in two by storms last year but it lives on. Sunlight picks up the colours of larch needles beautifully at this time of year. Greetings from Pond Cottage
This has been another year of the swan at Pond Cottage. Here the two adults are feeding with their four confident and healthy cygnets. We get through a lot of grain! The parents are still very protective but the cygnets are very endearing. We open our wild woodland garden to visitors through Scotlands Gardens Scheme supporting Children’s Hospices Across Scotland and other charities
A photo of Pond Cottage in the gloaming as bats were coming out to hunt. A glimmer of light through clouds making a silhouette of trees - and our chimney. Good to see and hear the bats with the help of an old bat detector.
A very traditional daffodil, trumpeting spring is here at Pond Cottage – there are lots of other varieties in the gardens
Cheery 'Jetfire' narcissus greet the spring sunshine at Pond Cottage. Each year they spread a little further through the garden.
Solar panels newly installed at our woodland - they lap up the sun - even in Scotland
Our wind turbine, unusually still, at sunset. This has been a very windy winter. During Storm Eowynn a neighbouring housing estate was without power for two days. With a combination of wind and sun power, our lights stayed on. Thank you renewable energy. Photo Fay Young.