THE dark evenings of January can be dismal and I often find myself longing for warm, sunny summer evenings.

However, I have found there are some advantages to the short daylight hours.

My favourite time of day is dawn as I always feel there is something almost magical about watching daybreak, particularly in January on a cold, frosty morning.

The short daylight hours also mean I don't have to drag myself out of bed too early to watch it.

I like to set off at about 6.30am, as this gives me time to walk a little way into the wilds to find a spot well away from the street lights with a panoramic view to the east.

Over the years I have discovered a few favourite places, which I frequent along the western floodplain banks of the River Severn.

If you do fancy this and set off on an early morning dawn watch there is always something which is bound to catch your eye on a clear night.

In the sky towards the south there is what appears to be a particularly bright star.

This is not a star however, but the planet Venus.

At this time of the year, it is shining so brightly it is still clearly visible until the sun fully rises at around 8am.

Looking up at this brightly shining planet, it is easy to let your imagination run free and picture what life might be like in other worlds.

In the past, scientists thought Venus was covered in a vast ocean of carbonated "fizzy" water.

But, these days more technologically advanced scientific methods have revealed conditions on Venus are far more hostile.

The likelihood of life existing on the planet would appear to be very remote.

Venus has suffered from what looks like the greenhouse effect in the very extreme.

Many millions of years ago, when the sun was a little cooler than today, scientists believed Venus was much more like a sister planet to Earth, especially as it had an atmosphere and much of it's surface was covered with liquid water oceans.

As the sun slowly began to shine more brightly, the oceans began to evaporate and carbons were leached from the rocks, creating a severe greenhouse effect. This led to the temperature at the surface of Venus reaching 500C.

Not only is there an extreme greenhouse effect, but intense acid rain, with storm clouds of sulphuric acid, blows in furious squalls across the surface.

While these conditions might preclude life now, in the past there was certainly a chance of life.

I wonder if in the future, men or their machines might be able to visit this world and discover new creatures and fossils.

For now though, we can only imagine just how fantastic these creatures might have been.