Tag: nature

Close encounters of the winged kind

This week I have been getting entirely too close to nature, or rather, it has been entering my personal space to different degrees of acceptance from me. But before all that, I have just trodden on a slug – with bare feet! That would be me with the bare feet, of course, not the slug although I guess their one foot is always bare. Anyway, that is how my week ended with regard to wildlife interaction. Squishy.

Earlier in the week I was undertaking the all-too-regular event of trying to get one, the other or both of the cats in for the evening. We keep them in overnight these days which is much better all round: better for us having less vets bills to pay from all the night time scrapping, better for the cats as they have less injuries from all the night time scrapping and better for all the other wildlife as there is less night time killing.

On this night, small cat had evaded our early calls and had taken himself off on a long hike. Either that or he was deploying the tactic big cat uses which is to sit a mere few feet away, hidden and absolutely ignoring our calling and cat treat rattling. But it was a warm night and had become that wonderful time when all the crepuscular creatures head out for foraging, courting and the ever popular night time scrapping. As I stood calling to the small beast I was given a close fly-by by a bat. We get at least one on most nights at this time of year and its lovely to see them lapping the garden. I think I must have been in its flight path though, and I’m sure I could feel it touch lightly as it flew by. I love bats, so this was not a problem.

The next morning, I was sitting outside with a hot water and lemon for a bit of fresh air before starting work for the day. Tucked away with jasmine and honeysuckle behind me, buddleia and a eucalyptus to the left and a plum tree to the right I was nestled neatly among flora. Which is perhaps why a beetle was unable to navigate around me in time and came and gave me a bumbling headbutt before making its awkward flight away. This encounter was fine also. In the same place and only a few moments later a female blackbird skimmed my head having taken off from the fence behind the jasmine. I think she was more startled than I was. (I could not help but think of Carl Bovis, a nature photographer I follow on Twitter who posts amazing pictures of birds in flight with wings and legs tucked in and looking as if they had been pointedly thrown at him by his enemies.) But, a low-flying bird is also quite alright with me.

What was not alright was my next encounter of the week. After a spot of gardening I put my jogging bottoms back on and was having a nice chat with MOTH in the kitchen when all of a sudden I felt a rather painful stab on my bottom (left cheek, if you needed to know). Discarding the joggers to investigate it became clear that there was a wasp in there and the little git had just stung me. This was not alright. I was not best pleased in the least. MOTH was very good and managed to stop from outright laughing for some time, including when I lay down and asked him to put an apple cider vinegar soaked cotton pad on the, ahem, area. (By the way, this absolutely works for wasp stings to bring down the redness and itching.) Three days on and I can still feel it, but its ok, you can all laugh, even I find it funny – until I sit down.

Hips, Haws and Fairy Wings

Red and green should never be seen, says…well, it seems perhaps no-one. It is one of those phrases that many of us have heard and yet the origins seem to be somewhat muddy. It might be purely about fashion; that it was considered the two colours just didn’t complement each other. But, it seems as many people know the phrase as blue and green, so down that road we can insert any colour as the one not to be seen with green. There is also a view that it refers to the lights on a ship, green on the starboard side and red on the port meaning that, if you can see these colours when out in your own boat, you may well be headed on a collision course.

But, as it always does, nature defies the rules (whatever they may be) and red and green are often seen – and very pleasingly so. I took a five-minute sit outside after work today. The weather wasn’t particularly pleasant but I find I desperately need at least a few minutes outside a day to feel (vaguely) human. Armed with a warm drink* I sat out by our small pond and noticed that the seasons were showing their turning. Tangled waterfalls of red berries and green leaves are draping from the hawthorn trees. Towering
over my head and reaching almost down to the floor, they are like a vertical carpet of nature having a go at pointillism.

Behind me, a rose has gone to hip. I play the game, each year, of trying to balance the dead-heading of flowers to prolong the blooms coming out, but also leaving enough to turn to hips, because the birds love them so. I have made rosehip tea in the past, collecting, cutting, scraping out the insides and drying the hips and it was tasty – but, a lot of not very pleasant work. The inside of a rosehip is filled with prickly, sticky hairs and they all have to be removed or will be an irritant when drinking. It takes a long time to prepare so many fiddly little hips and I know from experience that I don’t really have the patience.

The honeysuckle flowers are all pretty much all gone now but the tiny, shiny red berries punctuate the long meandering tendrils. It doesn’t seem to matter how much or when I cut this particular honeysuckle back, it soon
swamps everything around it. The weeping crab apple tree is also in fruit now -and occasionally cat. (Big cat is a climber and it is not unusual to look out of the window and see his head peeping out from the top of the tree.)

And there is more to come, the pyracantha (the spiny, spikey, flesh-ripping beast that it is) will keep the blackbirds in snacks all winter and of course, the holly will be ready to decorate the house at Christmas time.

But we also have a scattering of fairy wings in what I (optimistically) call our woodland area (the shady bit under mystery tree**). White and pink cyclamen gather in groups, standing small but proud from their round tubers. Cyclamen have their seed heads on tight coils which when ripe project the seed head and seeds onto the ground – the sticky seeds are then sometimes moved about by ants. Just imagine if you could capture the pinging and flinging of seeds by the release of tensed coils on film – I can’t help but visualise it in some sort of Acme cartoon cannon style with some dramatic full-orchestra music going on behind the whizzing and whirring.

But this week hasn’t been just about flowers; pond life has had its show too. Poking about my mum’s garden, having a catch up on what has and hasn’t survived the ridiculous heat followed by winds and torrents of rain, we spotted a frog making use of the plant pot tray on her patio. It seemed quite happy and we think perhaps waiting for some of the dropped insect-based bird food from the feeders nearby. And we have a new resident, Gary. Gary is a snail who was doing the sterling job of keeping my niece’s fish tank clean. Alas, the fish are no more, which is timely actually, as niece is just about to head off to university. Needless to say, my sister was not about to keep a tank going in her daughter’s absence for just one snail, and so Gary was ferried over to our pond via a small tub with holes in and a fruit basket in the footwell of my car.

*If you’re interested; a mix of cacao powder, turmeric, ginger, cinnamon and star anise with hot water and unsweetened almond milk. Yes, yes I am ‘that’ person.

**We know it is a cotoneaster, but it was unidentified for so long, it will never be called anything but mystery tree in our house. *Whispers* it also has its own theme tune.

The simple pleasure of a pine cone

This week the weather quite clearly has no idea what it is doing. Or, if it does, it is working to some indecipherable plan that we are not privy to. I had to put a jumper and socks on today, for which I was actually more than happy. The few days we had midweek week where the temperatures tipped into the thirties, were far too much for me; I barely functioned. Perhaps it’s because I spend a good ninety-five percent of my life feeling cold and wearing at least three more layers than everyone else (I have been known to wear seven layers in winter) that when I finally get warm, my body has no clue what to do. After the scorching heat and dragging the electric fans out of the cupboard and discarding the duvet, the last two days have been more bearable, even if a little confusing.

We were promised thunderstorms this week; they did not come – which I was annoyed about. We have had some rain, intermittent sun and
cloud but goodness, a lot of blustery wind. But that didn’t stop me taking a post work stroll on which I experienced hot sun, high winds and rain in regular revolutions.

On my walk I had two incidences where I was very aware of how I am becoming more and more accustomed to simplicity and the pleasure and freedom it brings. The first was when on leaving the house I pocketed only my keys and my phone (and a tissue, but there is always at least one of those resident in any of my pockets). A while back, when we were in much stricter lockdown and supposedly not leaving the house but for the essential shop,  I tweeted about noticing that bags seemed such redundant irrelevances. They sit there waiting to be filled and carted about and for some reason they struck me as rather absurd at that point. And I am someone who has far too many bags of all shapes and sizes – just in case! But today there was a feeling of lightness and liberty in the grab-and-go of so few items. (I wonder if this is how men have always felt. Perhaps if decent pockets in women’s clothing had been de rigour from the start we wouldn’t have become so accustomed to dragging bags around with us at all times.)

The second moment was as I neared home. I was mildly grumping at this point as the last public footpath, that takes me across a field to my home, has once more not been looked after by the land owner and is again impassable; so I had to take the road route. But, by doing so I passed some large pine trees under which many cones had been scattered on the ground, most crushed by passing cars but one excellent, fat specimen called to me. As I picked it up to bring home I realised I experienced the same feeling as I have done in the past when buying a new item of clothing or the such. I read a book recently which talked about how we get used to new things so quickly that they lose their ‘spark’ in very little time which is what compels us to then buy again and again and again. It’s why some very rich people have multiple cars of huge value and still never feel satisfied. They are merely looking for the next hit of new. That being the case, perhaps a pine cone really can have the same excitement-producing reception in the brain that a new pair of boots can.

In some ways we have all had to live a little more simply recently and at the beginning I had hopes that this would have a positive impact. But, like so many people, I have been appalled and quite upset at the sheer magnitude of people and the destruction and littering they have left behind at some of our destination spots. I dared to dream that out of this strange time we are living through, there might have risen a more compassionate, thoughtful and caring collective consciousness. But it would seem that now, perhaps more than ever, we appear to be a species divided between those that think beyond their immediate bubble and those that don’t. I find it hard to not fall into the thinking that, I am right and they are wrong, nothing is that clear-cut of course, but I simply can’t understand the continued devastation on large and small scales across the globe of the beautiful world we are lucky to inhabit. Nor the drive some seem to possess to split us into divided groups of people based solely on geography, aesthetic, lifestyle choices and all the things that make us so wonderfully rich and diverse and of these differences that we should be celebrating and sharing.

It doesn’t help that there are so many ways now to see so much of this negative behaviour. Sometimes I have to go on a news and social media break just to give my (admittedly very sensitive) heart and brain a break from it all. I want to believe there is more good than bad. It is always worth seeking out happiness and care and opening our eyes to the little things that can bring comfort and hope, and to find the joy in the simple things.

To this end, my pine cone and I will be quite happy at home. It will sit in my bowl of found natural treasures, all of which make me smile – yes, even the skulls. And if you need a break from the treadmill of bad news, you can join me on a very blustery walk in the video below. The wind shaking the trees and rustling the long grasses speaks louder than I can, but I don’t mind being drowned out by nature.

Grazing Bales

Sunday, late afternoon; I’ve just been out for a short post-work walk and am wondering why I don’t do so more often. I always feel at my best mentally and emotionally when I am outside and in nature.

Today, the weather and scenery were stunning. Having just had several days of rain, (which I was most happy to see arrive after the driest May on record had the land scorched to dust) the sun has returned. Yesterday was all big blue expansive skies that seem to be bigger than they ought to, today the blue has been punctuated with white cloud and a slight breeze.

The route I took is quite short and one I have done many times before. If I don’t dawdle (which of course, I always do, stopping to look, smell, feel and listen to all the wonders around me) I can leave the house and be back again in half an hour – if I rush. But why rush? I’ll never understand people who charge their way through a walk. Why aren’t they stopping to trail their hands in the long grass, to peek into ditches, do they not close their eyes and breathe the fresh air pretending for a brief moment that nothing else exists? I can’t imagine going for a walk and not holding stones or picking up feathers or peering as close as I can at insects and lamenting, as ever, my lack of bird call knowledge when I hear the twittering around me. Although, today, I was quite happy that I was able to identify a chiff chaff.

Not all land owners and farmers are great at encouraging people to walk the public footpaths by keeping them clear and easily identifiable – there are a few round here like that. But, others are very good at it, and my walk begins around fields on a path that is kept mown; wide enough for one, or two if you are very close. I was led initially by several tiny brown flittering butterflies who appeared to skip about only a few inches ahead of my toes. One finally settled long enough on a butter cup for me to take a quick (terrible) picture and I think they were small heaths. The area I was currently walking round has been left to go to wild land and long grasses and the beautiful feathery fronds jigged in the breeze with their soft green and purple hues. Beautiful. But, as with as many places there is talk of it being built on which saddens me greatly. I can see brambles beginning to flower in the hedgerows, bringing promises of delicious fruits to come. I will be out picking and eating later in the year.

A little further along my walk I spot a large black shape on a nettle leaf. Looking closer it is a caterpillar, dark and bristly; looking extremely gothic. As I peer further into the nettle patch, I see that there are in fact many of them, all on nettle leaves, and so once more I take to my books and the internet to find out what they are: the caterpillars of the Peacock butterfly.

The reason I had stopped and began perusing the nettles was because I was getting myself back together after being highly startled by a pair of pheasants. I think though that they may have been more startled by me. I gave my apologies, especially as it was a male and female I had rudely interrupted. They flew off in the clumsy, flapping barking that they do without giving me the courtesy of an apology for scaring the life out of me.

Against all the blue, green and yellow of this early summer day, large shining black plastic greeted me next – the covering for bales of straw. My best friend and I have long loved the sight of bales in fields, particularly as we feel they always seem as if they are grazing. Many a time we have sent each other pictures of such with the caption: grazing bales. I may have tweeted a video at her this time.

My head and heart by this point wanted to continue to walk for hours. Unfortunately my body, with its various ails, does not comply and so reluctantly I begin to head home. I can manage an hour of gentle walking but by the end will still be in pain, so I am learning to take things easier than I would like – learning but not liking – I get very grumpy about this.

But I am blessed, I know, to be able to go out at all and also to be close enough to be out in nature so quickly. I know not everyone can and so I recorded just a short part of my walk, which you can watch below. Watching nature and imagining yourself in it can be beneficial too. When I was going through cancer treatment, I would sometimes close my eyes and take myself off for a walk in my mind. I would imagine every detail from putting on my shoes and picking up my keys, to what I would see and feel out there; and I’m sure it helped me. Perhaps, if you can’t get out, for whatever reason, I can give you this little bit of nature.

In comes I, in search of a surprise angry panther

This week has included  St George’s day, a day for which I have no particular affiliation, but I do have fond memories. Anyone who has read past blogs will know that I grew up in the folk world with all its wonderful, and yes, quite frankly odd, traditions and practices. One of which is the performing of mummurs plays: folk plays by amateur ‘actors’ (see, more often beer happy folkies) that usually contain within them, a sword dual, a dragon slaying and a quack doctor who would bring the slain hero back to life. (Although there are many, many regional variations.) As ever, they were often an allegory for the fight between good and evil as well as for the seasons and crops returning to life after winter.

When a character enters the scene in a mummers play, he (and traditionally it was always men) would announce themselves beginning with, “In comes I,…” and the discourse would often be held, in a strutting and goading manner and usually in rhyming couplets:

“In comes I, Saint George! An heroic man,

With steely sword, my shield in hand.

I fought the fiery dragon

And sent him to the slaughter,

And for this deed I won the hand

Of the King’s beautiful daughter.”

The reason I have fond memories, is not just of watching many of these plays at street fayres between bouts of morris and clog dancing, but of being in one during a solar eclipse – many years ago. We were in Devon, or Cornwall, or thereabouts (I think) so many folk camps blur into one homogenous folk life. On this day most of the campers made their way to the top of a hill to witness the mystical event and as the time drew nearer, a group of us set about a mummers play.

As strong as my memory of the beauty and awe of the eclipse and how everything fell silent as the shadow descended, and as much as I remember the strangeness of the feeling of such a magical moment; I just as much remember that the huge men’s trousers I had borrowed for the play, that were held up only with string, kept threatening to fall down as I proudly introduced myself: “In comes I…”   and then very nearly, out went dignity.

In the current situation, I have structured my time so that I work at my desk every morning, garden usually in the afternoon and if I have any energy left after cooking tea, set about my personal work later. As such, the garden is getting more attention than usual. This week, I have been on the hunt for a surprise angry panther. Let me explain. Last year, a flower emerged from amongst an area of, well, chaos, in one of my borders, that I couldn’t quite place. Popping it on twitter and asking for identification help, a gardener friend of mine replied that it was an agapanthus, but an unusual looking one. The best thing though, was that they told me that they called them angry panthers, and to this day, that is what I call them too. I know roughly where it is located but the ground covering mat of ajuga, pulmonaria and creeping cinquefoil, has hindered any precise pinpointing – hence the search.  So far, the angry panther remains elusive, but I live in hope.

Talking of elusive nature, the orange tip butterflies are a cheeky bunch fluttering about but never landing long enough to take a picture. And, I am pretty convinced I found badger poo in the garden. When I told MOTH to come and see something interesting, he was not at all convinced when I said it was poo, until he saw it and reluctantly had to agree that it was, actually, interesting. I have seen a badger in the garden before, so it is quite possible.

Other garden activities have been checking each morning whether any new veg have begun to poke above ground – potatoes, onions, climbing beans, courgettes and garlic are romping ahead leaving the peas and spinach wheezing and panting at the back of the pack. The weather is proving glorious for us humans, but as a gardener I am feeling the pain of nature trying to compete with increasingly parched earth. We have four water sources available in a variety of locations for wildlife, but it is the plants I feel for, trying to push through baked clay – and we are only in April! Perhaps I should write and perform a one-woman mummers play to the rain gods to see if we can entice them to show our land some mercy. Six weeks into isolation – this doesn’t sound quite so mad an idea.