Nick is a member of the team who spends a day a week at Coombes Valley. He's the current Stepping Stones to Nature intern and he is working with ourselves and three other partner organisations to gain a diverse range of conservation related skills. Nick has plenty of creativity, so to draw on that, here's a lovely blog that he's penned for us. Over to you Nick......

Autumn really is one of the nicest times of the year. I thought some photos of the reserve accompanied by the first stanza of John Keats'  'Ode to Autumn' would be a nice way to show this bittersweet seasons progress here at Coombes Valley.

Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,


Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;


Conspiring with him how to load and bless

With fruit the vines that round the thatch eve run;

To bend with apples the moss'd cottage-trees,


And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;

To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells


With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,

And still more, later flowers for the bees,


Until they think warm days will never cease,

For summer has o'er-brimm'd their clammy cells