We are fortunate to have another natural archway very close by. This leads to Barton Court, formerly the home of Sir Terence Conran, now of Pippa Middleton and her family. It was a favourite walk or cycle with the children and we knew it as the conker way (as opposed to the donkey way, or the squirrel way, which was one of the routes to primary school). I did not expect to see so many species – I almost saw none until I reminded myself actually to look. I have been able to identify none of them with any real confidence and most of them not at all. I was delighted to hear and see (just about) a group of Long-tailed Tits – I find them impossible to photograph, so restlessly and quickly do they flit about.
This is I think a lichen, possibly common Greenshield Lichen at an early stage of development. The BBC’s Countryfile website enlightens: “Lichens are not plants, and neither are they single organisms. They are bizarre mixed organisms in a mutual co-operation: half-fungi, half-algae, and sometimes home to cyanobacteria too. They are barely understood … ” There is so much we don’t know.
I wondered how this injury was sustained: the tree seems to be a remarkable survival in the circumstances.
A lovely spot and our favourite for the game of Pooh Sticks.
I haven’t a clue what these are nor whether the first is the same species as the other two, but they might be Tyromyces chioneus or White Cheese Polypore.
This may be Beefsteak fungus.
And this perhaps King Alfred’s Cakes.
Is this a young Slow Worm living in a Beefsteak fungus or some smaller species?
I am most confident or least unsure about this very distinctive Aniseed Funnel, Clitocybe odora.
This could be Pluteus salicinus, or another species from the genus, which Wikipedia tells me is psychedelic.
I don’t know what drew me to take this photograph but life is full of coincidences. Over lunch afterwards I started reading Amy-Jane Beer’s The Flow; rivers, water and wildness, of which much more another day. Suffice to say for now that it has moved me very close to tears several times in the first thirty or so pages alone. She writes of a river scene: “The longer I look, the more subtle features I see. Micro-eddies, upswellings, swirlings and little [fingertip] dimples.” What is odd is that I had never really noticed them before, let alone had them drawn to my attention in writing minutes later.
Front-page news in our local paper: a man has been arrested on suspicion of attempted murder. Details are hazy but it may be that the victim confronted a group of men in a field whom he suspected were poaching. The alleged perptrator knocked him down with his vehicle. It is a stark reminder of what we have been told by two Wildlife Crime Officers during two separate talks to our badger group, that confronting such people is extremely dangerous. One of them said that badger-baiters and their ilk would “not hesitate to attack us, so don’t think they will hesitate to attack you.” Like fox hunters, whether the ones on horseback in silly red coats, terriermen or other supporters, violence comes easily to them, often as a first resort, as has been relentlessly documented. It is hardly surprising, what they are doing is a manifestation of their extremely violent urges in the first place.
The government does seem to be moving forward in terms of the criminality of the water companies. Chris Packham has announced a march in London this Sunday (“wear blue”) and I have ordered a free poster from the campaign group 38 Degrees which shows Thames Water’s crimes and the fines imposed for them. As Chris Packham says of his local river, the algal water and concomitant absence of bird, insect and fish life is heartbreaking.
As for the budget, I am no analyst of economics. I do of course see that money desperately needs to be spent on education, health, the state of our roads and much more. It is hardly surprising that there is a shortfall – the taxpayer was robbed blind for years by the Tories. But the anti-monarchist group Republic staged a protest and released a new report pointing out that the royal family costs us £500m or half a billion pounds per year. The government wants to throw even more money down the drain on HS2 as well, which I thought they said they were going to scrap altogether, since no one wants or needs it and so much damage has been done. But then they said there would be no tax rises. John Major did the same, but straight away increased VAT from 15% to 20%. “Oh we didn’t mean that kind of tax” they say. Keir Starmer must have known he was going to be asked to drill down on his definition of a working person, which we now learn is a category that mysteriously does not include employers. Why he hadn’t been better prepared by his advisors I cannot imagine, but he cut a ludicrous figure tying himself in knots and digging himself ever deeper, to mix metaphors, saying that a working person was someone paid monthly by cheque but who couldn’t write a cheque to get themselves out of difficulties. I literally cannot remember when I last saw a cheque.
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