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The Fullness of Time: Marking the Day by Birdsong, Blooms, Shadows, and Stars
A joyful exploration of nature’s daily rhythms and a call to notice the wonders of the natural world, wherever you are.
Most of us live fully digitized lives, staring at screens and tracking our data. We think of time as the relentless march of abstract, identical hours that control the shape of our days. But what might we gain from exploring the forgotten art of sensing the natural patterns of the world around us?
Cathy Haynes argues that by paying more attention to the living rhythms of plants, animals, and light, we stand to reap inner riches that can bring us fascination, delight, and comfort in a time of tumult. To discover a new sense of time, she draws on the knowledge of astronomers, botanists, ornithologists and experts on sundial-making, shepherding, and traditional work songs.
In an earlier world, we used to mark daily cycles by shadows shrinking or the midday glow over a mountaintop. We called a phase of darkness “cockcrow” and named lively flowers for when they open and close. When working, we may have synchronized a task by singing. We’d notice the quality of the light changing at dusk and mark the passing of night by the motion of the stars.
The Fullness of Time is an invitation to tune into the subtle changes happening around us throughout the day, even in the concrete-and-glass heart of the twenty-first-century city. Charming, gentle and wise, it offers a chance to realign ourselves with the rhythms of the natural world and a reminder to pay attention to the wonders before us if only we look around.
Most of us live fully digitized lives, staring at screens and tracking our data. We think of time as the relentless march of abstract, identical hours that control the shape of our days. But what might we gain from exploring the forgotten art of sensing the natural patterns of the world around us?
Cathy Haynes argues that by paying more attention to the living rhythms of plants, animals, and light, we stand to reap inner riches that can bring us fascination, delight, and comfort in a time of tumult. To discover a new sense of time, she draws on the knowledge of astronomers, botanists, ornithologists and experts on sundial-making, shepherding, and traditional work songs.
In an earlier world, we used to mark daily cycles by shadows shrinking or the midday glow over a mountaintop. We called a phase of darkness “cockcrow” and named lively flowers for when they open and close. When working, we may have synchronized a task by singing. We’d notice the quality of the light changing at dusk and mark the passing of night by the motion of the stars.
The Fullness of Time is an invitation to tune into the subtle changes happening around us throughout the day, even in the concrete-and-glass heart of the twenty-first-century city. Charming, gentle and wise, it offers a chance to realign ourselves with the rhythms of the natural world and a reminder to pay attention to the wonders before us if only we look around.
- GenresNonfictionNature
288 pages, Hardcover
Published April 21, 2026
24 people are currently reading
383 people want to read
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December 31, 2025
Ask “What time is it?” today and the reply might come from a clock, a watch, a coffeemaker, a microwave, and a stove or an of the myriad time-keeping devices of the 21st century. In “The Fullness of Time,” British writer Cathy Haynes explores just how people marked time in less technology-focused eras. Prior to mass transportation and large scale industrial employment, the need for accuracy was less important. But who doesn’t wonder when it’s time to head home for dinner, whether working in a modern highrise or overseeing a herd of sheep due back home for the night?
Haynes discusses the older, more earth-centric methods of timekeeping that most of us missed by centuries. Our own awareness of time is so far removed from these methods that there is something almost alchemical about the processes. Yet they worked well enough for humans to rely on them through the centuries prior to widespread use of timepieces. We may still notice some almost unconsciously. Spend some time regularly enjoying a morning cup of coffee on your back porch, and you’re liable to pick up on when the bird chorus first begins and start timing your coffee to coordinate with its first trills. Do it often enough and you, like Haynes, may learn to note the exact point at which a particular type of bird begins its song. While such timelines are dependent on factors like seasons of the year, geographical location, variety of species, and environmental changes, it’s still possible to detect some broad patterns that suggest the time of day.
Farmers who are intimately familiar with their land and their stock are among the contemporary experts Haynes interviewed. There’s a regularity to the practice that encourages observation of the natural world in which they work. Tasks like twice a day milking of cows encourage awareness on the farmer’s part of when shadows grow longer and bees head to their hives. Haynes documents such subtle changes as the shape of animal’s eyes, which adjust much more obviously than our own to changing light. Cats, goats, and sheep all possess eyes that register those changes.
Flowers too respond to light in particular ways, opening or closing in response to sunlight. Morning glories, 4 o’clocks, dandelions all offer hints as to the hour, as do sunflowers and marigolds, their habit of following the light compared by early observers to the Christian’s need to follow the light of God. Just as birds do not appear all at once in the morning, flowers too vary in their habits, leading ambitious researchers of the past to attempt to create flower clocks that tell time by specific reactions on the part of a collection of plants.
Humans devised their own tricks of measuring time in the natural world, Haynes reports, such as work songs aimed at establishing a rhythm of work as well as a way to approximate the time a task took. Haynes points out that during the Covid pandemic, it was common for handwashing time to be measured by two choruses of “Happy Birthday.” People also developed scratch dials and stick dials, early forerunners to the sun dial that, though far less precise, provided enough information to suffice in a pre-industrial economy. Photographs by Haynes and her partner Rosie help the reader understand what such devices looked like and where they might still be found today in ancient churches or even untended woods.
Tracking the path of sunlight over a familiar landscape provides another source of chronological data for those attuned to the earth. Finding the “daymarks” or landmarks by which locals trace time is familiar with those living in mountain hollers where the sun’s path is late in the day and relatively brief.
Haynes’s enthusiasm for the subject, her willingness to travel far and wide, asking questions of professionals and everyday observers of earthly patterns will engage readers. It will also encourage them to observe more closely their own landscapes as they learn how people in the past navigated time. “The Fullness of Time” would make a great read for those who enjoy deep dives into nature and how the world works. Its publication date is April 21, 2026, and I do plan to order the book for the library.
Haynes discusses the older, more earth-centric methods of timekeeping that most of us missed by centuries. Our own awareness of time is so far removed from these methods that there is something almost alchemical about the processes. Yet they worked well enough for humans to rely on them through the centuries prior to widespread use of timepieces. We may still notice some almost unconsciously. Spend some time regularly enjoying a morning cup of coffee on your back porch, and you’re liable to pick up on when the bird chorus first begins and start timing your coffee to coordinate with its first trills. Do it often enough and you, like Haynes, may learn to note the exact point at which a particular type of bird begins its song. While such timelines are dependent on factors like seasons of the year, geographical location, variety of species, and environmental changes, it’s still possible to detect some broad patterns that suggest the time of day.
Farmers who are intimately familiar with their land and their stock are among the contemporary experts Haynes interviewed. There’s a regularity to the practice that encourages observation of the natural world in which they work. Tasks like twice a day milking of cows encourage awareness on the farmer’s part of when shadows grow longer and bees head to their hives. Haynes documents such subtle changes as the shape of animal’s eyes, which adjust much more obviously than our own to changing light. Cats, goats, and sheep all possess eyes that register those changes.
Flowers too respond to light in particular ways, opening or closing in response to sunlight. Morning glories, 4 o’clocks, dandelions all offer hints as to the hour, as do sunflowers and marigolds, their habit of following the light compared by early observers to the Christian’s need to follow the light of God. Just as birds do not appear all at once in the morning, flowers too vary in their habits, leading ambitious researchers of the past to attempt to create flower clocks that tell time by specific reactions on the part of a collection of plants.
Humans devised their own tricks of measuring time in the natural world, Haynes reports, such as work songs aimed at establishing a rhythm of work as well as a way to approximate the time a task took. Haynes points out that during the Covid pandemic, it was common for handwashing time to be measured by two choruses of “Happy Birthday.” People also developed scratch dials and stick dials, early forerunners to the sun dial that, though far less precise, provided enough information to suffice in a pre-industrial economy. Photographs by Haynes and her partner Rosie help the reader understand what such devices looked like and where they might still be found today in ancient churches or even untended woods.
Tracking the path of sunlight over a familiar landscape provides another source of chronological data for those attuned to the earth. Finding the “daymarks” or landmarks by which locals trace time is familiar with those living in mountain hollers where the sun’s path is late in the day and relatively brief.
Haynes’s enthusiasm for the subject, her willingness to travel far and wide, asking questions of professionals and everyday observers of earthly patterns will engage readers. It will also encourage them to observe more closely their own landscapes as they learn how people in the past navigated time. “The Fullness of Time” would make a great read for those who enjoy deep dives into nature and how the world works. Its publication date is April 21, 2026, and I do plan to order the book for the library.
April 29, 2026
QUOTES FROM THE BOOK
From the Introduction
“We used to tell time by shadows shrinking or the midday glow over a mountaintop. We called a phase of darkness ‘cockcrow’ and named lively flowers for when they open and close. When working, we may have synchronised a task by singing. We’d notice the quality of the light changing at dusk, and we might mark time at night by the motion of the stars. Now we depend heavily on complex machines and think of the hours as identical abstract units. In the urbanised West today, so much of our world would not function without super-precise clocks. But what riches might we gain from exploring the forgotten art of sensing time by events in the world around us? … even in the tarmac-and-glass heart of the twenty-first-century city.”
From Ch. 1 Dawn Song and Bat Flit: Heeding the habits of fellow creatures
“The dark blue sky soon becomes luminous enough to see the ducks flying silently overhead. The pine, ash and oak, which moments ago were blunt, flat shapes, are tangling up with ivy. The pale clay track is unveiling its treacherous puddles. Milky drifts of mist are appearing in the valley like the aftermath of magic. And while the brightening world starts to resume familiar form, the whistling hedgerows thicken with the songs of blue tits, goldfinches, chaffinches and dunnocks. An Old English word for daybreak is dæg-wōma, literally ‘day-noise’. [Here on the farm] the dæg-wōma has gained singer after singer until – about twenty minutes before sunrise – it’s in gloriously full voice.”
From Ch. 2 Day’s-Eyes and Turnsoles: Following the hours of flowers
“It seems to me that once you start noticing the population of these special kinds of plant in your area – when you’re on winking terms with your local daisies [“day’s eyes”], say, and sensitive to the habits of the creeping wood sorrel in a street gutter – the world starts appearing with a new filter. A flowerbed is not only a source of sensory pleasure but a site of intrigue. Even a straggly clump of opportunists in a pavement crack is no longer something to ignore. Once you’re alive to the habits of marigolds and all the rest, they leap out from the crowd, and soon you’re seeing ‘time’ wherever there are flowers and leaves.”
From Ch. 3 Waulking Songs and Furlong-Ways: Beating time by the human voice and body
“In the West now, not many of us associate creating music with work. But [in the Outer Hebrides] song and poetry were tightly woven into everyday life … The songs were tailored to the rhythm and speed of the work in hand…”
From Ch. 4 Scratch Dials and Stick Dials: Dividing the day by the flow of shadows
“Many modern sundials are sophisticated instruments designed to find with precision the same ‘equal’ hours that clocks keep. ... But my particular enthusiasm is for the marvellously variable rough-and-ready methods past generations had of telling time by shadows: by arranging sticks in the turf, observing the shadow of their own body, or etching wobbly lines into walls.”
From Ch. 5 Daymarks: Tracing time by the light over the landscape
“All around Iceland there are places named for the time of day, like Early-morning Cairn, Morning Valley, Midday Hill, Mid-afternoon Mountain, Evening Ruin, Night-time Waterfall. These special kinds of landmark are known as daymarks and were once common across Norse cultures. But they survived for much longer in Iceland and have left exceptionally vivid traces.”
From Ch. 6 The Gloaming and the Dimpse: Sensing time by the colours and qualities of twilight
‘Gloaming is likely to have come from an old Germanic root, glô-, which also gave us the word ‘glow’. It may have referred to the gleaming of sunset (or sunrise) before coming to mean the dim and shady twilight. And yet this audible ‘glow’ in gloaming still feels apt. Because at day’s end, of course, the world doesn’t just fade to black as if a celestial dimmer switch is being turned down. In the prelude to the night, as the light starts to drop, the sky burns with its most intense colours of the day.”
From Ch. 7 Star Clocks: Marking time by the motion of the night sky
“To gesture to the sky – to orient yourself in time and space by mapping the movement of the stars against the local skyline with your own lively digits – feels remarkably different from casting a glance at a machine. It’s among those other ways of gauging time by the body and the senses – by the shrinking of a shadow, the glow over a daymark, the changing colours of the sky and air – that binds us to our present world.”
From the Introduction
“We used to tell time by shadows shrinking or the midday glow over a mountaintop. We called a phase of darkness ‘cockcrow’ and named lively flowers for when they open and close. When working, we may have synchronised a task by singing. We’d notice the quality of the light changing at dusk, and we might mark time at night by the motion of the stars. Now we depend heavily on complex machines and think of the hours as identical abstract units. In the urbanised West today, so much of our world would not function without super-precise clocks. But what riches might we gain from exploring the forgotten art of sensing time by events in the world around us? … even in the tarmac-and-glass heart of the twenty-first-century city.”
From Ch. 1 Dawn Song and Bat Flit: Heeding the habits of fellow creatures
“The dark blue sky soon becomes luminous enough to see the ducks flying silently overhead. The pine, ash and oak, which moments ago were blunt, flat shapes, are tangling up with ivy. The pale clay track is unveiling its treacherous puddles. Milky drifts of mist are appearing in the valley like the aftermath of magic. And while the brightening world starts to resume familiar form, the whistling hedgerows thicken with the songs of blue tits, goldfinches, chaffinches and dunnocks. An Old English word for daybreak is dæg-wōma, literally ‘day-noise’. [Here on the farm] the dæg-wōma has gained singer after singer until – about twenty minutes before sunrise – it’s in gloriously full voice.”
From Ch. 2 Day’s-Eyes and Turnsoles: Following the hours of flowers
“It seems to me that once you start noticing the population of these special kinds of plant in your area – when you’re on winking terms with your local daisies [“day’s eyes”], say, and sensitive to the habits of the creeping wood sorrel in a street gutter – the world starts appearing with a new filter. A flowerbed is not only a source of sensory pleasure but a site of intrigue. Even a straggly clump of opportunists in a pavement crack is no longer something to ignore. Once you’re alive to the habits of marigolds and all the rest, they leap out from the crowd, and soon you’re seeing ‘time’ wherever there are flowers and leaves.”
From Ch. 3 Waulking Songs and Furlong-Ways: Beating time by the human voice and body
“In the West now, not many of us associate creating music with work. But [in the Outer Hebrides] song and poetry were tightly woven into everyday life … The songs were tailored to the rhythm and speed of the work in hand…”
From Ch. 4 Scratch Dials and Stick Dials: Dividing the day by the flow of shadows
“Many modern sundials are sophisticated instruments designed to find with precision the same ‘equal’ hours that clocks keep. ... But my particular enthusiasm is for the marvellously variable rough-and-ready methods past generations had of telling time by shadows: by arranging sticks in the turf, observing the shadow of their own body, or etching wobbly lines into walls.”
From Ch. 5 Daymarks: Tracing time by the light over the landscape
“All around Iceland there are places named for the time of day, like Early-morning Cairn, Morning Valley, Midday Hill, Mid-afternoon Mountain, Evening Ruin, Night-time Waterfall. These special kinds of landmark are known as daymarks and were once common across Norse cultures. But they survived for much longer in Iceland and have left exceptionally vivid traces.”
From Ch. 6 The Gloaming and the Dimpse: Sensing time by the colours and qualities of twilight
‘Gloaming is likely to have come from an old Germanic root, glô-, which also gave us the word ‘glow’. It may have referred to the gleaming of sunset (or sunrise) before coming to mean the dim and shady twilight. And yet this audible ‘glow’ in gloaming still feels apt. Because at day’s end, of course, the world doesn’t just fade to black as if a celestial dimmer switch is being turned down. In the prelude to the night, as the light starts to drop, the sky burns with its most intense colours of the day.”
From Ch. 7 Star Clocks: Marking time by the motion of the night sky
“To gesture to the sky – to orient yourself in time and space by mapping the movement of the stars against the local skyline with your own lively digits – feels remarkably different from casting a glance at a machine. It’s among those other ways of gauging time by the body and the senses – by the shrinking of a shadow, the glow over a daymark, the changing colours of the sky and air – that binds us to our present world.”
April 23, 2026
4.5 stars
Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
Time is a construct for how we spend our days, allowing us to schedule events with others, meet deadlines, sleep, eat, work, and play following a collective rhythm. We use the clock and hours to agree on when to do those things. And yet, another type of time exists: the time of nature where the indications from the color of the sky, the opening of a flower, the movement and calls of insects and animals, or the position of the sun and stars are used predict outcomes or schedule events—because (as explained by scratch dial expert Ben Jones) as long as everyone in the community uses the same conventions to mark time, everyone will be in agreement.
Cathy Haynes grew up on a farm where her parents and grandparents lived by nature time. She describes days and seasons through their eyes and others in this lovely book, “The Fullness of Time.” Haynes spent years exploring plant time, birdsong time, singing time, sundial time, and night time. She read broadly, researched, and spoke with many experts in the fields of botany, medieval history, anthropology, zoology, and astronomy. Each chapter focuses on a different way to measure the passing of time, determine the hour of the day or night, the completion of a project or a season.
After spending time looking for daymarks in Iceland, she begins looking for her own daymarks at home in London, the time of day sunlight strikes a place in the floor or shines along her aptly named Noon Street. She joins an astronomers club to learn about the night sky and how to tell time by the stars. Haynes invites readers to look for their own daymarks and consider marking time by the sun, the passing of a daily train, or the cheers of students leaving school for the day.
Reflective, poetic, and informative, The Fullness of Time encourages us to slow down and observe the world around us. In closing, Haynes recounts that her study of telling time using nature has led her to pay more attention to the world around her and less attention to her phone; for many of us, that in itself is reason to read and learn from this book.
Thank you to NetGalley and Riverhead Books for providing an ARC in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.
#netgalley #thefullnessoftime
Cathy Haynes grew up on a farm where her parents and grandparents lived by nature time. She describes days and seasons through their eyes and others in this lovely book, “The Fullness of Time.” Haynes spent years exploring plant time, birdsong time, singing time, sundial time, and night time. She read broadly, researched, and spoke with many experts in the fields of botany, medieval history, anthropology, zoology, and astronomy. Each chapter focuses on a different way to measure the passing of time, determine the hour of the day or night, the completion of a project or a season.
After spending time looking for daymarks in Iceland, she begins looking for her own daymarks at home in London, the time of day sunlight strikes a place in the floor or shines along her aptly named Noon Street. She joins an astronomers club to learn about the night sky and how to tell time by the stars. Haynes invites readers to look for their own daymarks and consider marking time by the sun, the passing of a daily train, or the cheers of students leaving school for the day.
Reflective, poetic, and informative, The Fullness of Time encourages us to slow down and observe the world around us. In closing, Haynes recounts that her study of telling time using nature has led her to pay more attention to the world around her and less attention to her phone; for many of us, that in itself is reason to read and learn from this book.
Thank you to NetGalley and Riverhead Books for providing an ARC in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.
#netgalley #thefullnessoftime
May 1, 2026
„Дори в шума и врявата на тъмните ни улици, проявленията на природата остават“
/ Марсел Минаерт, Фламандски слънчев физик и астроном
"Но за толкова много от нас ограниченията на работното време и живота на закрито означават, че сме склонни да пропускаме драмата на небето. Как бихме могли да бъдем убедени да отидем до прозореца и да излезем на улицата, за да му се насладим повече? В „Кое време е това място?“ (1972), визионерският американски градоустройствен специалист Кевин Линч се оплаква как все по-честото ни съществуване на закрито ни отдалечава от признаците на времето от природните цикли."
" Стив паркира колата до наблюдателницата си в сумрак: порта, обърната на запад, към пасище за добитък на няколко мили от морето. Промъкваме се през калта до сивата метална порта и оглеждаме пейзажа. Зелените пасища са пресечени с кафяви живи плетове. Покрив на хамбар се показва зад дърветата. Далечните хълмове са топло сиви, гладки и ниски, като китове, разбиващи вълните. Небето е бледосиньо и златно, с тънки кичури бяло и розов облак. На земята около нас въздухът изглежда по-мрачен и по-син. Но усещането ми, че все още е ден, сякаш се потвърждава от трептяща суматоха на дългоопашати синигери, които за кратко се настаняват и подсвиркват в живия плет до нас."
/ Марсел Минаерт, Фламандски слънчев физик и астроном
"Но за толкова много от нас ограниченията на работното време и живота на закрито означават, че сме склонни да пропускаме драмата на небето. Как бихме могли да бъдем убедени да отидем до прозореца и да излезем на улицата, за да му се насладим повече? В „Кое време е това място?“ (1972), визионерският американски градоустройствен специалист Кевин Линч се оплаква как все по-честото ни съществуване на закрито ни отдалечава от признаците на времето от природните цикли."
" Стив паркира колата до наблюдателницата си в сумрак: порта, обърната на запад, към пасище за добитък на няколко мили от морето. Промъкваме се през калта до сивата метална порта и оглеждаме пейзажа. Зелените пасища са пресечени с кафяви живи плетове. Покрив на хамбар се показва зад дърветата. Далечните хълмове са топло сиви, гладки и ниски, като китове, разбиващи вълните. Небето е бледосиньо и златно, с тънки кичури бяло и розов облак. На земята около нас въздухът изглежда по-мрачен и по-син. Но усещането ми, че все още е ден, сякаш се потвърждава от трептяща суматоха на дългоопашати синигери, които за кратко се настаняват и подсвиркват в живия плет до нас."
April 25, 2026
Thank you NetGalley and Riverhead Books for the review copy of "The Fullness of Time" by Cathy Haynes.
This was an interesting and entertaining read about tracking time. Time, or at least the idea of it, dictates so much of our lives, and I often wondered how people measured time before clocks were widely available. I knew about sundials, of course. Probably every schoolkid has made a rudimentary paper plate sundial for at least one science class. And I understood that the passage of time could be gauged by the stars.
Haynes takes readers on a walk through time, beginning with the observance of plant behavior at different times of day and night. She and her partner visit cathedrals with sundials etched into walls and explore Iceland learning about daymarkers, and finally look to the stars. My favorite part was definitely the chapter about plants (and I took notes!), but I found this an engaging book overall, and recommend it to anyone else who wonders how time works and why.
This was an interesting and entertaining read about tracking time. Time, or at least the idea of it, dictates so much of our lives, and I often wondered how people measured time before clocks were widely available. I knew about sundials, of course. Probably every schoolkid has made a rudimentary paper plate sundial for at least one science class. And I understood that the passage of time could be gauged by the stars.
Haynes takes readers on a walk through time, beginning with the observance of plant behavior at different times of day and night. She and her partner visit cathedrals with sundials etched into walls and explore Iceland learning about daymarkers, and finally look to the stars. My favorite part was definitely the chapter about plants (and I took notes!), but I found this an engaging book overall, and recommend it to anyone else who wonders how time works and why.
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
In the days before watches people had a way of telling time by the use of nature. Author Cathy Haynes takes us on a leisurely stroll down 7 different methods of determining time.. From birds to flowers, sundials. colors of twilight and the stars above. We begin to realize how out of touch we really are with the ways that nature communicates with us and that the world did survive for thousands of years without being tied to down a clock on a wall, a watch on our wrist or a phone that is an atomic clock. Wonderful effort and I learned so very much about nature along the way.
3.5***
3.5***
Review of advance copy
A quirky, enjoyable read. I learned a lot and also hope to be more aware of my natural surroundings.
May 7, 2026
One of my favorite books that I’ve read so far this year.
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