NATURALLY THINKING

I looked out of the back bedroom window one morning and thought, yes, it might be warm, but this is definitely November.

The lawn lay under a carpet of wet, brown leaves from the apple tree and the borders were still filled with the drooping death of summer annuals and perennials.
The distant and not too distant fields were hidden in mist. All was quiet, all was still.
After that long, hot, dry summer it at least looked normal at last.
I am lucky enough to sometimes feel I am living in a glade in a wood because there are so many trees all around me.
Now nearly all the deciduous leaves have fallen and only those of a neighbouring contorted willow are still clinging on.
Most of the orange berries from one of my rowans have already been eaten by the blackbirds, the other is still laden with pink berries.
They probably won’t be eaten until well into the new year.

I wonder what the difference is to a bird’s taste buds?

Perhaps they are more sour early on. I have a cotoneaster which was only planted two years ago, and that has quite a good crop of red berries.
Hopefully these will coax fieldfares and redwings into the garden one day, the main reason for my getting it.

One day recently I heard something on the radio about salmon stripping that took me back to our old home in Devon.

A friend of ours owned a fishing inn in a tiny village which we had visited so many times that it eventually led us to move into that beautiful county.
Because our friend’s world revolved around the River Torridge, it followed that he had a lot to do with the stocking and watching over the fish in his stretch of the river.
He regularly took part in salmon stripping at this time of the year, which is done to help conserve fish stocks.
Hen fish are stroked along their length to release the eggs and the same is done to the cock fish to release the milt.
The milt and eggs are then mixed and released, either into a hatchery or back to the river into the redds, the pockets in the river bed made by the female.
On one memorable occasion, Brian and I were walking along the banks of the Torridge and stopped on a bridge, to watch six salmon jostling for position over a shallow area of gravel, much paler and cleaner looking than the surrounding river bed.
It was a sure sign that the females had been making their redds.
The females were in the deeper water just to the side and slightly above the redds, then they drifted backwards, nose upstream until, with sudden quicksilver movements, they were over the gravel, jostling each other out of the way.
As we walked on towards the weir, we saw one salmon actually in the process of making a redd, flapping around on her side whilst frantically beating her tail to scoop out a hole.
The river tumbled over the weir into foaming white water. Every so often from the turbulence came a tremendous flurry of activity as fish launched themselves into space in their efforts to get over the top to the next level.
There seemed to be a large number doing this, most of them a good size – 8 lbs or more – and one really huge thing that was considerably larger than the others that it didn’t make much effort to jump very high at all.
Maybe he’d done it in so any previous years that he couldn’t be bothered any more. Many others however reached three quarters of the way up before sliding back down again, and every now and then some reached the top.
It’s amazing what makes them defy nature in this way.
There was, after all, a much easier way up – a fish pass that had been specially built for them just to the side – but very few of them used it whilst we were watching.
After each flurry of activity there was a lull of two or three minutes and I could just imagine the fish getting their breath back beneath the white cauldron of water before their leader shouted, “Ready guys? Ok – go, go, go.”

What a marvellous month it’s been this year.

The colours have been spectacular, although all seemed to be over quite quickly.
The first week in November was windy and over the weekend, many trees were almost stripped over night.
My cherry, however is still throwing its gold and scarlet leaves around, on the road, into neighbouring gardens and carpeting my front lawn and borders.
I’ve no idea how old this tree is but it must be at least 40.
This winter I shall have to have it pruned again as it’s finding the telephone wires to tangle in and it is getting far too big for my small space.
It’s a beautiful thing although its bubble pink blossoms always seem to herald a strong wind in spring.

What a strange year it has been, not just here but, I think, world wide.

When the rain at last arrived at Goldsneys, the thirsty earth gulped it down, then seemed to think it was spring.
I have a large clump of white candytuft flowering profusely as though it is April, even though the bulbs for next spring were only planted three or four weeks ago and I think I can see the first early daffodils of some of the more established ones already poking through.
Quite a bit of the rain we have had during the last few weeks has fallen at night, which is very obliging of it.
However, the temperature is much higher than it should be for this time of the year.

Oh, it would be so good if we had a spell of really cold weather again.

Quite apart from the fact that it would be normal, it would smell of winter, with that sharp scent of frost and perhaps the occasional smoky scent from a bonfire.
And right now I suspect inside many houses there will be that very particular spicy smell of Christmas – things like puddings boiling and rich fruit cakes baking.
A very happy and peaceful Christmas to you all.

Out of the blue, a friend asked me if I had ever heard of tardigrades.

This bit of information must have passed me by all my life, because I hadn’t a clue what she was talking about.
I think this is surprising because there are countless numbers of them, all around us in the great outdoors.

Google, as usual, was a great help.

They are apparently vital in the great scheme of things in that they are a food source for other microorganisms which live in the soil and provide the nutrients necessary for its decomposition.
In fact, they seem to be right up there in the important food chain. It would also seem that I must have millions of the things on my roof because they thrive in the moss that grows there.
These microscopic monsters are the most resilient of creatures, living almost anywhere, from the tops of mountains to the depths of oceans, from ice to hot springs, and they particularly love mosses and lichens.
They have even been found in five million year old fossils so they‘ve been kicking around for quite a long time.

They’re not very pretty

In fact, basically they are just a head and they’re so ugly that their structure and clumsy movements have been the inspiration for many of the baddies in science fiction, only considerably enlarged of course.
In close up pictures you can see a sort of minute nose and up-tilted, closed eyes, and then four segments with eight pairs of legs.
They’re also known as water bears or moss piglets.
I don’t have to love them of course, but since my friend sort of introduced me, and I’ve read a fraction of the reams about them on Google, I have got a little bit interested.
At least if I leave the moss on my roof I’m doing a bit towards rewilding!

At last I’ve been out on Genevieve

She and I haven’t had a good airing since last October, it was especially gratifying.
Someone told me that there wasn’t much to look at but I found lots.
It was fine and sunny and the sun glowed on the leaves of the Hart’s Tongue ferns on the banks of the ditches.
Mosses growing on the old trunks of trees in the hedges gleamed like well brushed velvet and back-lit the large holly tree near the bottom of Rowden Mill Lane. Celandines gleamed from the verges and a few clumps of Primroses joined them here and there.
A bank of the stream has been cleared leaving the water clear and gurgling beneath the pack horse bridge.
I can’t see how far the clearance goes, but it has certainly made a big difference and, presumably has helped towards cutting down on the flooding at that point.
The hedges have been cut back – it’s amazing how ravaged they look to begin with and how they recover so quickly.
All hedge cutting had been delayed because of the never ending rain, and by October they had grown so much that the lane felt as though it was enclosed by high walls.
Now, though there was no obvious change in them, they look as though they are ready for tiny leaf buds to make their first clue that something different will happen very soon.

Everywhere was wonderfully silent.

Somewhere in the distance I could hear a tractor and watched it toil its way up and down a far off field, otherwise nothing.
No birds because they don‘t often sing in the early afternoon, and not even the distant barking of a dog.
And the views – oh I have missed the views of the distant misty hills and the trees silhouetted against the skyline.
There is something different about those trees too.
They don’t look quite as stark now but seem to hold the promise of spring.
Yes, it was a deeply satisfying outing and as I bumped my way over the track home, I thought, spring is really on its way.

No nature notes from me this month as I’m afraid I have nothing to write.

I have, since sometime in November been in Dorchester Hospital then the Yeatman and at present The Old Vicarage Care Home in Leigh, where, incidentally I had originally planned to remain until either I popped my clogs or my money ran out!
On another occasion, over 6 years ago now, I had decided to do the same thing. On that occasion shortly after Brian had died, the well-known and much loved village philosopher came to see me on the first morning, sat cross legged on the floor and said ‘So what’s all this nonsense about not going back to Goldsneys?’
On that occasion I murmured feebly something about memories etc, to which he retorted, ‘So will those memories not be with you wherever you go?’
So, after a period of a few weeks of mature reflection and with my friend‘s words still ringing in my ears, I went back and didn’t regret it.

This time, it was a bit different.

I don’t think I had been really well for a few weeks before I was actually ill, and just felt that I couldn’t cope with anything any more.
Had that particular gentleman been around on this occasion I’m sure he would have given me an equally good lecture, but alas he now has terrible problems of his own and I worked it out for myself.
I think it took under a week, when I looked around my little room, and thought, ‘is this it then?’

Too pig-headed to give up my independence just yet!

I looked at the activities arranged, I’m sure, with skill, but they were for the elderly and I do not feel in the least elderly in spite of my 90th birthday creeping relentlessly towards me this year.
I practised my mobility skills once or three times a day and they took me past many rooms where small, quiet bodies sat or lay immobile.
I know there are two residents who are 102 years old, one of whom still plays the piano and paints beautifully, but I don’t want to belong to a group where age will be my qualification from now on.
I do not want to be enticed to eat in a group when my preference is to eat on my own in case I embarrass myself and others by choking.
I do not want to join sing-alongs when I have completely lost any trace of singing voice I ever had, and I had no wish to join in with colouring or jigsaws, though these are obviously well thought out and pleasurable as well as necessary for many.
One thing that I would have been interested in was a film about the history of Sturminster Newton but that didn’t fit in with other things that were on my own schedule.
In short I am just too pig-headed to give up my independence just yet – if ever.

So I am going home after all.

Just a few things to put in place – carers etc. – and hopefully I should be back where I belong, in the lovely village that I have been proud to call my home for over 19 years and to once again be amongst the marvellous people I am privileged to call my friends, by the end of the month.
I think I have probably painted a dismal picture of a care home, but I hasten to say that this one, along with hundreds up and down the country, is marvellous.
It’s just that I am not yet ready for it.

Please don‘t misunderstand me, this is a really lovely place.

There are about 30 rooms, all set around at ground floor level in a large circle, so you can never really get lost whichever way you go.
Carers, managers, administrative staff and chefs, gardeners and those who do the odd jobs, are all first class, although of course, when you have been here for a while, you do have favourites.
Each room looks onto a series of courtyards, some planted, others opening onto bright, sunny seating areas.
Residents are encouraged to bring in bird feeders, boxes or tables if they want to, so there is plenty to watch. One lady of 100 has her little dog with her whilst another has her budgie in its cage.
Residents are obviously treated as the individual that they have been all their lives and not just grouped together as one amorphous mass as is so often the case these days.

The Gardens

The gardens themselves have obviously been planned and planted by a real gardener who knows exactly what he/she is doing and loves doing it.
I can see large rose beds, already pruned with their first winter pruning, containers of all shapes and sizes planted additionally with healthy looking wallflowers, whilst other, smaller ones contain a carefully pruned shrub.
Shrubs overall seem to have been chosen with something to look at all year round and there are bulbs sprouting up everywhere.
On a wide, natural grassy space edged by tall trees and backed by the countryside of Leigh. I’d like to bet that there will be masses of bulbs which will be a picture.

I will leave here with happy memories

I have come across some remarkable and endearing people.
And the endless patience that the carers have will always remain with me.
They never made me feel that anything I asked for, however trivial, was too much trouble.
But for me – I’m homeward bound, and by the end of January I now know!
Margaret Waddingham