The Midwife has arrived…

in her black and white uniform.

Who called her? Nobody knows. But she knows: she knows exactly when every baby is due and she moves in a day or so before to watch over the mother.

Unlike her human counterpart she has no concern for the mother, she is here to collect the placenta and the membranes. There’ll be no rotting flesh on our fields to attract predators. All will be whisked away by the midwife bird.

She, or he, has been working up the valley following the wave of lambing which creeps up with the warming air and the growth of the grass. The first sign of her presence is a smear of wool on the field; she has taken the liberty of pulling some wool from a ewe’s back to line her own nest and leaves a little on the grass, alarming as she chose the wool marked with red marker — does the colour of blood attracts her?

Magpies are hated by most farmers because of their partiality to another delicacy: they will peck the eyes from dead sheep and sometimes from not-quite-dead sheep and even from the head of a partially born lamb.

This upsets farmers (not surprisingly) but the flash of this bold and watchful bird will often alert him to a miscarriage, premature lambing or a fallen ewe and you can see magpies on occasions, perched on the back of a sheep, patiently picking out maggots from soiled wool which, if left, would attack the skin and eat into the sheep’s flesh causing rapid septicaemia from fly-strike and death if untreated.

Magpie looking for parasites and maggots

The midwife bird is here to warn you that lambing is nigh — ovine tempers are frayed but the fields are drying out nicely so

brace yourselves for an avalanche of lambs.

Ecology, Humour

Eye shine — you shine but I don’t

I spend a lot of my time with individuals who see the world through very different eyes.

For a start their eyes shine at night, not with avarice or the holy spirit but with any light that they catch in their eye —

Eyeshine in Welsh Mountain Sheep

You see they are a prey species and they stand out all night in the darkest fields uneasily looking out for wolves and rustlers so they need to see in the dark. One of the adaptions that many nocturnal mammals have made is to acquire a tapetum lucidum, a biological mirror behind their translucent retina, so that light stimulates the retina as it falls upon it and stimulates the retina’s photosensitive cells again as it bounces off the mirror layer heading back the way it came — this helps them to see in the dark.

So when you go out in the field at night with your torch and all the sheep turn to look at you because they think you are something spooky, all their eyes light up with intense pale green light, all directed at you, which is definitely spooky.

Dogs have a tapetum lucidum too — this one shines bright green.

There’s a sheep behind him. Foxes have eyes that glow green, different species have variation in their tapetum lucidum and glow differently — hunters who went out lamping for rabbits and foxes (I think it’s illegal so they don’t do it anymore) will tell you they can tell what they are shooting by the shade of the eyeshine, as they charge around in a truck with a lamp on top picking up eye glow and shooting things — very fortunately humans do not have a tapetum lucidum, otherwise more of them would get shot.

Cats are famous for their glowing eyes and that is where I got into trouble. I spent a happy evening flashing and snapping at our cats, trying to demonstrate their eyeshine and their strange lozenge shaped pupils that constrict down to a tight vertical slit in bright light — you see one of the problems for these creatures, who are adapted for the dark, is managing bright light. Mainly they shut their eyes.

Cat dealing with bright light

Partially dilated pupil

Mid-position pupil, not round nor slit

Wistful in bright sunlight – pupils narrow vertical slits

Minutes after this unsuccessful photo-shoot, Midnight (our short haired black cat) started doing something very strange and alarming, kicking his right foot out then grabbing at his mouth with both his paws as if trying to pull something out of his mouth — he did this repeatedly making a peculiar slavvery noise. There wasn’t anything in his mouth or throat, he wasn’t salivating or retching and there was no sign of a bite or sting on his lips. The other cat and the dog looked worried and followed him round fussing as he repeated his odd stereotyped gestures, like non-verbal Tourette’s Syndrome. OMG he’s been out and got a head injury, or a brain tumour… Or epilepsy due to flashing lights.

There then ensued a period of research on the internet. While the cat twitched, quietly now, on its chair by the fire, the other two animals sat upright on the floor next to him watching anxiously.

By the time my husband had got home I had cracked it — Feline Hyperaesthsia Syndrome… Can be provoked by stress ( like being chased around the house with a flashlight). This is a diagnosis of exclusion and mindful of vet’s bills we adopted an expectant policy — we’ll watch and expect it will get better.

It did — for twelve hours or so he looked spaced-out between twitches that gradually got less complicated and with longer gaps between them– first the kicking disappeared, than the grabbing at his mouth, then the licking of his lips gradually stopped and he had a long sleep. Then he woke up and had a large breakfast and has been fine since. We didn’t photograph any of this — we thought I had done enough harm.

Returning to the great mysteries of the mammalian eyes that follow me daily —

Horizontal rectangular pupil and fetching eyeshade of pale lashes

Why do cats have vertical pupils and sheep horizontal ones?

They both need to be able to restrict the bright light of the mid-day sun. Cats need very sharp vision, right in front of them and the potential to use a whole cross section of their lens (this has complicated optic reasons to do with putting back together the spectrum that bending light tends to produce), thus they need a vertical slit because they are predators and they pounce on little creatures right in front of them.

Sheep need a more global view of the world, they live on grassland and need to be able to spot movement all around.

With her protruding eyes and wide pupils, she can see from right in front and to right back along her flanks. Provided she walks in a slight zig-zag, which they do, she can see all around herself, even in bright weather when her pupils are constricted — she couldn’t do this with a vertical pupil.

Dogs have round pupils like us but can see in the dark — they have reflectors at the back of their eyes which shine but are not so sensitive to the light that they need slit pupils to protect themselves by day — I suspect this is because at night they see mainly with their noses!

Ecology, Humour

Kissing Frogs

Now is the time to look for signs of Spring and here, where there is still snow in the shadow of the hedges, we haven’t seen a bulging bud. But the birds know something’s up! They have a sense of anticipation and an irritable awareness of their territory — the robins are scrapping and the chaffinches have started to sing and me? Well, I go out every morning to look for frogspawn and on the morning after Valentine’s night — there it is!

Something for our newts to eat.

Otherwise things look quite wintery though the moss is strangely spruced up and vibrant.

It’s making the most of the early sunlight before being caste into shadow by the burgeoning verdure that will soon overwhelm it — the uncurling fronds of the ferns and bracken and the canopy of oak leaves.

And the lichens are looking shaggy after a winter unfettered by the competition and unbroken by the resting bottoms of weary ramblers.

The wild unicorn on Van Hill still has his winter coat and hasn’t started yet to get his new horn when he will hide in the woods like the moss.

Ecology, Hill Farming, Humour, lifestyle

Hearts of Oak

‘The measure of a man’s importance is the size and number of his woodpiles’.

I was told this fact many years ago in rural France — it made a great impression — so contradictory was it to the progressive philosophies of my young French friends that I found it oddly reassuring — and still do!

We have woodpiles — burning wood when you have lots of trees is great but trees need cutting down and they don’t go quietly, they have a lot of stored energy and can lash out ferociously. They need logging and drying and wood burns amazingly quickly so you need loads and plenty of room for storage. We have an old barn, thirty feet by twenty feet already full of timber.

Last back end (as they say in Lancashire) we culled a Leylandii hedge, grown 40 feet high in a blink of Mother Nature’s eye. We cut off the branches and burned the brush-wood —

— but when the exalting roar of the chain saw had stalled for the last time we were left with a daunting amount of timber — a mountain where our new workshop was waiting to be built.

There it lay until last week when we were taken in hand!

Not by the Forestry Commission or the satellite snooperage of Rural Affairs, Wales (it was nothing to do with illicit romance in the hills) — it wasn’t even our very grown-up children who, though they never tidied their rooms, now worry about the state of their decrepit parents. No, it was a young neighbour (well relatively young) who knew that all we needed was a tiny push, a little encouragement.

‘I’ll come and help you on Tuesday — I’ve nothing much on this time of the year — I’ll be with you at midday.’

We refused, we protested, we were tempted, we said he’d have to have lunch (would there be meat? — Yes), he accepted, we capitulated, it was arranged and, in the intervening few days, we got on with what we should have been doing for months!

By the time Tuesday came we had started two new woodpiles and that day something strange happened — tree trunks scudded over the ground, whizzed through the air, crashed into trailers, flattened the saw trestle and just about spifflicated two pensioners temporarily under vigorous new management.

Chainsaws started willingly and logs marched to the music of the Sorcerer’s Apprentice jumping happily onto the new woodpiles.

By evening, by some miracle of effort and teamwork, well mainly one man’s effort (we helped as hard as we could and tried not to get in the way) we had uncovered the bare earth where our new workshop is to be sited.

Temporarily repaired trestle on the almost cleared site — Digger just watched and didn’t help at all.

It’s a miracle. Just another of the miracles of living here — Thank you David!

New Woodpile

Ecology, Wales

Common things being common

The grasshoppers that jumped out and away wherever you trod in our field last summer were green and there were lots of them. That might make you think that they were Common Green Field Grasshoppers but with talk of global warming, climate change and species in all the wrong places (A Dartmoor Blog https://adriancolston.wordpress.com) I have been inspired to have another look at my photos and to try to be more precise in my identification.

First impressions may well have been correct and this confirms me in the belief that things should be named for what they are, although in this case I had such difficulty in photographing him that Brown Kneed Elusive might be a better name.

If you recognise this creature please leave details otherwise he will remain Omocestus viridulus, the common green field grasshopper.

Ecology, Humour

Solar Psychosis

It’s a crisp winter’s morn — heavy frost but brilliant sunshine — the man said that was the best situation for the photo-voltaic cells — got to dash — got to look at the meter — we’ve got a little house with a smiley face — the water’s hot and we are exporting — our newly minted electricity is flowing into the National Grid — that’s bad, we should be using it — it’s free — got to put the washing machine on — WE’RE GENERATING!

Whoops — No we’re not — the sun must have gone in — I’ll just pop out and look at the sky — we might manage a short wash later, between clouds — Oh no! Look! We’re importing! Oh Alan, the smiley face has gone.

Something must be on! I’ll check that all the lights are off, is the fridge motor running? You haven’t put the kettle on, HAVE YOU? The computer’s on? Oh yes, so it is.

That’s it — I’ve got it — acute green-energy dementia! I think that’s how they work, the solar panels — not so much by generating as by focusing you on switching things off!

Like a Druid I watch the movement of the great celestial orb. Our fixed panels are a compromise between a right angle to the sun’s rays in summer and a right angle to the rays in winter so are almost always at a wrong angle — this results in rumination and ranting.

We are constantly checking. Look! they are in shadow.

It’s those damn trees!

I can’t see! I’m blind from looking at the Sun!

Ecology, Humour, Thoughtful

Frazzled? You’ve got Red Queen Syndrome

The Red Queen by Bill Brooks Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic (CC BY-SA 2.0)

Red Queen Syndrome is running (or riding a turtle) to stand still — the first documented sufferer was the Red Queen in 1871, in Through the Looking Glass and what Alice found there (I played the White Queen once — it was my finest hour, but a long time ago). The phenomenon was recognised in 1993 by Matt Ridley — The Red Queen, Sex and the Evolution of Human Nature explored our origins and the need for constant evolution to keep one jump ahead of our competitors, our predators and, particularly, our diseases. As the Red Queen said,’Now, here, you see, it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else you must run at least twice as fast as that!’

John Tenniel’s illustration — 1897 edition of Through the Looking Glass and what Alice found there.

It’s a long time since I read Ridley’s book and at this distance I can only remember the messages that I took away from it — woven into my own narrative of life — the need for the greatest genetic variation in a population so that the maximum options are available in case of emergencies (don’t forget Darwin) — those threats which will inevitably emerge to confound us, due to the constant pursuit of organisms whose job it is to harm or out- perform us. Oh, and the need for sexual reproduction and our sexual fascination with those most different from ourselves — Jack Spratt Syndrome! It is the quest for new and useful genes — affording us the greatest possibilities to adapt or die.

This holds for almost everything — from our adaption, through natural selection, to emerging diseases and changes in our environment to our behaviours, technologies, economies, emotions and societies. Everything is evolving all the time so we have to run to keep up.

As I slow down it seems to be getting faster.

My husband and I watch the prices of oil and electricity increase so we invest in solar panels. We’ll be able to heat our water for free! But the immersion heater, which we have never used, is not responding — out with the electrical screw-driver — running to stand still — developing new skills. Bang!

My computer is poorly, a problem in its power pick-up, it cannot be repaired because things have moved on in the 4 years since I bought it — no parts available, not made any more. I have to buy a new computer — full of innovation — I have to run to stand still, change my behaviour, find all the secret clicks, do everything differently — where’s my e-dictionary — won’t open — connection broken — run troubleshooter — OMG. Passwords won’t work — ‘Have you forgotten your password?’ No I bloody haven’t. I will adapt and soon this new computer will seem second nature — I’ll probably even dream within its constraining matrix , but it will go on evolving and eventually (probably quite soon) it, or its successor, will out-run me.

People don’t get too old to do their job — the job evolves so that they no-longer recognise it. The job out-runs them!

Now I’m going to try to download a picture of the Red Queen which may well take some time.

Helena Bonham-Carter as the Red Queen from the film Alice in Wonderland, 2010, by Tim Burton. Attribution 2.0 Generic (CC BY 2.0)

Ecology, Humour

Doricum spotted in Wales!

When faced with plants he did not know my father would confidently pronounce them Doricums. ‘Shouldn’t it be Dorica?’ we would ask.

‘No, Doricums. The word is derived from the Greek, or possible the Zoroastrian,’ he would concede. Doricums grew everywhere in Hertfordshire — my dad was not much of a gardener.

Last spring we dug some gravel from the stream bed to create a pool to encourage fish, we left the gravel in a heap at the waters edge. Normally a fox would have placed a walnut whip on its summit — they do this to announce their ownership of all heaps — sand, salt for the roads, compost, even large mole hills — but this mound of gravel has become subject to another interloper — the dastardly Doricum!

Have you seen this plant before?

We have scanned the internet and looked at all our books but to no avail — although it does look vaguely familiar — we guess that it is feral or seriously out of context.

Do you have information about its true identity?

It has been nibbled but not by sheep, this gives it a spiky appearance — we’ve looked up squirrelwort and rabbit-bit in the index of popular names — its not even under badger-nip.

Is this a new species — D. notlikelae?

Addendum: 30.11.2023 St Andrew’s day and Winston Churchill’s birthday. On reflection this may have been a rather tatty example of Redleg (Persicarias persicaria L.) a member of the dock family. There is more of it about now and it looks more typical — sorry Dad!

Ecology, Nature Photography

Backswimmer in the wake of a dragon

I never seem to understand the limitations of my eye-sight or reaction-time and today I’ve been trying to photograph dragon flies again. I have many pictures of their wake — the disturbed but empty air just above the water where, just recently, they were — but wait… What is this?

Something lurking just below the surface — not clear enough to see.

Can you see what it is yet? Sorry! It’s what I call a water-boatman but when I look that up I find the term is ambiguous — it covers a multitude of sins — this needs clarification –I rummage in the shed for a fishing net and plastic punnet — the one without holes and bingo!

Notonectidae glauca or Greater Water Boatman

It is a Back Swimmer (Notonectidae glauca) Known in Britain as the Greater Water Boatman. It swims upside down (according to our prejudices) just below the surface of freshwater ponds, attracted to prey by the agitation of the water — the waves on the surface. It has a nasty toxic bite and probably ate all our tadpoles. It’s a proper bug and can haul itself through the surface and fly away though it didn’t when I hoicked it out to photograph it. I think its eggs develop directly into adults.

What about the Lesser Water Boatman? I hear you ask. He is called Corixa punctata — he swims the right way up near the bottom of the pond, is less agressive (a bit of a veggie) but is otherwise quite similar unless you have a macro lens — I shall look for him tomorrow.

Ecology, Wales

Images of Summer

Bloodsucker on Ragwort

The sight of this flower beetle takes me back to the sunny meadows of childhood where holding one of these bloodsuckers was a right of passage! Misnamed, they hunt the flower heads for tiny insects although this one seemed to be drinking nectar.

Bloodsucker on Meadow grass

Bloodsucker on Ragwort

Bloodsucker on meadow grass

Fairies gambol and flit by the pond — dragonflies whizzing past my lens at the speed of sound — boom! I know — shutter speed too slow!

Dragonfly

Dragonfly I took last year

Cheating — a blue chaser from August last year!

Just above the water of the pond, perched on a rush, is a tiny skipper — it seems to be laying eggs.

Orange Skipper — not clearest image

Here she is again

Skipper with her tongue out

Skipper laying Egg?

Impressionist image of Orange Skipper

In the back-ground on this idyllic day is the sound of this little chap, well thousands of him, and not heard often in wet Wales!

Can you see the Meadow Grasshopper?

Sorry — not always the crispest of images but I am working on it!

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Life on the Celtic Fringe

Category Archives: Ecology

The Midwife has arrived…

Eye shine — you shine but I don’t

Kissing Frogs

Hearts of Oak

Common things being common

Solar Psychosis

Frazzled? You’ve got Red Queen Syndrome

Doricum spotted in Wales!

Backswimmer in the wake of a dragon

Images of Summer

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