The hitchhiker

Sep22

This little news report struck me the other day. A Cape genet (Genetta tigrina), a kind of small carnivorous mammal related to civets and mongooses, has been recorded in the Hluhluwe-iMfolozi Park in South Africa hitching rides at night on the backs of buffalo and rhinoceroses. The photographs, taken by camera-traps, showed that on one night he hitched a ride on two separate buffalo and on a rhino!

He even has his own twitter account: the wonderfully groan-worthy GenetJackson.

Hluhluwe-Buffalo-and-Genet-1_edited_watermark-1024x733

Genet atop a buffalo …

… and a rhino

Experts at the park have established that it is the same genet in all the images. The Director of the Park, Dr Simon Morgan, has offered an explanation for the behaviour:

“We are not sure what is happening here. Looking at the photos you can see that in some the genet is literally going along for a ride, while in a few others the genet is near the head and could be picking ticks of the animals’ ears perhaps? It could be similar behaviour to cattle egrets which go for a ride and wait for the large animal to flush insects, so in this case the genet could be using this vantage point to spot small prey items being flushed by the buffalo or the rhino.”

Cape genet (Genetta tigrina). Photo by Jana.

Norwegian enamel jewellery

Sep16

I have favourite types of jewellery in my Etsy shop, and they come and go in phases. At the moment, I’m in a Norwegian enamel phase. There’s something about the crispness and craftsmanship in these pretty enamelled brooches. Plus, an extra bonus for me is that they are often based on designs from nature. They all date from the 1950s:

Aksel Holmsen enamel and silver with vermeil brooch, often called the 'lily of the valley' design. For sale at my Etsy shop.

Aksel Holmsen enamel and silver with vermeil brooch, often called the ‘lily of the valley’ design. For sale in my Etsy shop. (NOW SOLD).

Hroar Prydz enamel and silver with vermeil butterfly brooch. For sale in my Esty shop.

Hroar Prydz enamel and silver with vermeil butterfly brooch. For sale in my Etsy shop. (NOW SOLD).

David-Andersen enamel and silver with vermeil leaf brooch. For sale in my Etsy shop. (NOW SOLD).

David Andersen teal enamel and sterling silver ring, for sale in my Etsy shop. Click on photo for details. (NOW SOLD).

Hroar Prydz enamel and silver with vermeil butterfly earrings. (NOW SOLD).

UPDATE: For an up-to-date list of the Norwegian enamel for sale in my Etsy shop, including an enamelled sølje brooch, see here.

Norwegian jewellers have been producing enamelled pieces since the early 20th century. Probably the most famous jeweller is the firm of David-Andersen, with other notable jewellers who worked with enamel including (in alphabetical order) Marius Hammer, Kristian M Hestenes, O F Hjortdahl, Aksel Holmsen, Ivar T Holth, Finn Jensen, Bernard Meldahl, Einar Modahl, Hans Myrhe, Arne Nordlie, OPRO, Hroar Prydz, and J Tostrup.

Of all the designs, I like the butterfly brooches the most, and of those, the David-Andersen ones are stunning. I hope one day to catch one of those little beauties for my shop: until then I will have to suffice with drooling over those belonging to others:

David-Andersen neamel and silver with vermeil butterfly brooch, c. 1950. Sold at Tadema Gallery.

David-Andersen enamel and silver with vermeil butterfly brooch, c. 1950. Sold at Tadema Gallery. I WANT THIS!

David-Andersen enamel and silver with vermeil butterfly brooch, c. 1950. For sale at Ruby Lane.

Yet more David-Andersen loveliness.

And yet more …

Poplar hawk moth

Sep15

Chap found this little fellow yesterday on the ground underneath a neighbour’s aspen tree. Isn’t he stunning? Such gorgeous colours.

It’s the caterpillar of a poplar hawk moth (Laothoe populi), and I gather they feed on aspen, poplar and willow leaves. The aspen leaves are starting to fall so he might have been on one when it tumbled off the tree.

Poplar hawk moth caterpillar, 14 September 2014. Photo by Inglenookery.

I hope he wasn’t hurt—we aren’t sure what the clear liquid is, but hope it might be some sort of defence mechanism rather than indicating he is injured.

We aren’t sure what the clear liquid is, but hope that the little fellow wasn’t hurt. Photo by Inglenookery.

He’s such a gorgeous lime green colour with four rows of maroon spots, and matching bootees! Chap put him back under the tree: he’ll dig a hole and pupate there, and hatch out next year as a beautiful moth.

Poplar hawk moth. Photo by Hamon jean-pierre.

My spirit animal

Sep6

Meet Walter, my spirit animal. He lives near Siracusa, on the island of Sicily. He loves the sea. This is exactly what I want to do every single time I see the sea.

Run Walter, RUN!

Favourite websites: Kittenwar

Aug21

Kittenwar is another of my favourite websites. It’s a real time sink if you are a cat lover (like me): once you start looking it’s hard to stop.

Basically photos of two kittens/cats are shown side by side, and they ‘do battle’ as you vote for the cutest. The ‘winningest’ kittens and their stats are listed (hint: take a photo with your kitten’s paws and tubby tummy in full shot and you’re in with a chance), as are the ‘losingest’ (hint: if you have a sphinx or angular-headed Siamese, your darling is going to be on this list …)

I put up a photo of one of our two fudsies, Ballou, on 12 January 2006, and in those eight and a half years she has done battle 4,235 times. Her stats are a pretty steady 49% won, 39% lost and 13% drawn. I think she’s the cutest thing ever in the photo I entered, but that’s because I know she’s enjoying having her ears rubbed and is not being tortured, as it rather looks like …

Ballou. Kittenwar warrior. Not being tortured, honest.

Sunday stroll: south-western Wiltshire

Aug18

Chap and I did a short (c. 2 mile) circuit around our village yesterday lunchtime. We went through the village allotments, and saw a clouded yellow butterfly (Colias croceus) in the wildflower/conservation area there, the first we have seen this year, as well as a beautiful bright green beetle on some mint (the imaginatively named mint leaf beetle).

Mint leaf beetle, Chrysolina herbacea.

We startled a small flock of starlings out of a dense thicket of blackberries in the conservation area. I assume they were feeding there as 1 pm seems a bit early to roost!

Out of the village there is the Ox Drove, an old drovers’ road that is a haven for butterflies and other insects. (It was here, many years ago, we saw our first and so-far only glow worm (Lampyris noctiluca) on a summer’s evening).

The Ox Drove.

Here there were butterflies aplenty: we saw a brimstone, plenty of small whites, small tortoiseshells, speckled woods, peacocks, red admirals and some rather tatty holly blues.

Speckled wood butterfly (Pararge aegeria).

Holly blue butterfly (Celastrina argiolus).

We also saw a southern hawker dragonfly (Aeshna cyanea) to which I was able to get very close to photograph. I love their folk name of ‘Devil’s knitting needles’, even though there is nothing devilish about them (their larvae however are another matter when it comes to the stuff of nightmares …).

Southern hawker dragonfly (Aeshna cyanea).

The berries and fruits are splendid this year. The elderberries are positively dripping off the trees, the haws are colouring up, wayfarers and guelder roses have their bright red berries, there are loads of blackberries and best of all a pretty good sloe crop—not the best there’s ever been, but enough to pick a load for sloe gin and sloe vodka without damaging the birds’ winter larder.

Elderberries (Sambucus nigra).

Haws ripening on a hawthorn bush (Crataegus monogyna).

Wayfarer berries (Viburnum lantana).

Sloes (Prunus spinosa).

We walked through lovely countryside of low rolling chalk downland. Our part of south-western Wiltshire is given mostly to arable farming, often in very large fields (often made out of several smaller ones by ripping out the ancient hedgerows, sadly). Most of the crops have been harvested, but nearer to home there were still a couple of fields of wheat, barley and flax waiting to be brought in.

Chap doing his Maximus Decimus Meridius impression in a barley field on the way home.

Jersey tiger moths

Aug17

I have been in Devon for the past week, and during my visit I saw a moth I have never seen before. It was flying during the daytime, fluttering around some water mint (Mentha aquatica) that was in flower. Its flight was very flappy and fluttery and lollopy, almost as if someone was bouncing it around on a string from above. I knew it was a tiger moth of some sort because of the red flashes of the hind wing, similar to those on the scarlet tiger moths which frequent our garden. It was very bold and unafraid, flying very close to me.

I didn’t have my camera with me, curses, so once it settled on a mint flower and started feeding I made an effort to remember the beautiful patterning on its fore wings. Google was my friend, yet again, and told me it was a Jersey tiger moth, Euplagia quadripunctaria.

Jersey tiger moth (Euplagia quadripunctaria) on Hemp agrimony (Eupatorium cannabinum). Photo by Rosenzweig.

What surprised me was that the range of this moth is ‘widely distributed in Europe from Estonia and Latvia in the north to the Mediterranean coast and islands in the south. It is also found in West Russia, South Urals, Asia Minor, Rhodes and nearby islands, the Near East, Caucasus, South Turkmenistan, and Iran.’ So what on earth was it doing in south Devon? I read on.

Settled with its fore wings covering its hind wings. Photo by Hamon jp.

Until fairly recently, this moth’s only presence in the UK was in the Channel Islands. This raised questions—as northern France is not listed in its range (‘Mediterranean coast’ could possibly include southern France), how did it get to the Channel Islands? Was it an introduction there, either deliberate or accidental? It takes its English common name from the largest of the Channel Islands.

In Victorian times, apart from its presence in the Channel Islands, it was very rarely known in the UK, occurring mainly in one locality in Devon. Since then it has spread to Cornwall, Dorset and the Isle of Wight, with an outlier population in Kent. Another breeding population became established in London in 2004. The moths are gradually spreading northwards and eastwards from their West Country base. Fabulous!

It was very exciting to see a new and such a beautiful moth species. I wonder how long until they arrive in Wiltshire?

Update: They’re already here! On 12 August last year (2013) the second ever recorded Jersey tiger moth in Wiltshire was photographed at Trowbridge, which is north of us. So we might well see one sooner than I had hoped!

Jersey tiger moths on UK moths website.

Insect jewellery

Jul31

Now I know this isn’t for everyone, but I love insect jewellery. There’s something about the idea of wearing a bee or a spider or a ladybird as adornment: quirky, fun, and a pretty little celebration of the beauties of the natural world. They’re certainly not for those with arachnophobia or other squeams (I don’t know if that is a word, but if you can be squeamish, I don’t see why not!)

Scarab beetles were incredibly popular among the Ancient Egyptians for many centuries. Of these, the most famous example must be the stunning pectoral (chest decoration) from Tutankhamun’s tomb with its central yellow scarab, carved from glass sourced from the Libyan desert. This glass is really unusual—it was formed when a meteorite hit the desert sand and the extreme heat formed glass (glass is made from silica, and the most common constituent of sand is silica). The pectoral dates to c. 1323 BC.

The central yellow scarab beetle in Tutankhamun’s pectoral. The beetle is carved from Libyan desert glass, formed when a meteorite struck the sands of the desert.

I had a wonderful early Victorian turquoise glass scarab brooch in my shop, and was very sad when it sold—it was my favourite piece. I don’t know who made it, but whoever it was they had the most fantastic eye for detail and craftsmanship. It was a pretty wee thing and the level of detail was amazing. The lady who bought it adored it too and told me it was her favourite piece of all her jewellery. I love hearing things like that from my customers: it makes it so rewarding.

Early Victorian turquoise glass scarab brooch. Sold in my Etsy shop. (NOW SOLD).

The Victorians had a particular passion for insect jewellery. Their brooches were often expensive pieces, made with platinum or gold and encrusted with precious stones such as diamonds, rubies, sapphires and emeralds.

Victorian sapphire and diamond bumblebee brooch.

Victorian Abalone pearl, ruby, diamond and gold beetle brooch. French.

Victorian emerald, ruby and rose-cut diamond dragonfly brooch.

And I couldn’t leave out a nod to The Master, René Lalique (1860-1945). Here is a wasp hat pin of his:

René Lalique wasp hat pin.

Simply stunning.

I have three pieces of insect jewellery in my Etsy shop at the moment, none as grand as those above, but charming nevertheless.

A pair of spider brooches with green glass facetted stones for their abdomens and thoraxes make me chuckle every time I see them. They are joined by a chain and so can be positioned differently every time they are worn. They are made by a company called Mizpah; I haven’t been able to find out anything about this company so far. I think they date from the 1950s but they might be earlier. (Okay, I know spiders aren’t insects, they’re arthropods, but humour me in lumping them in with their six-legged friends). The bigger spider is ginormous – a full 69 mm (2 3/4 inches) across!

Two spider brooches joined by a safety chain. For sale in my Etsy shop. (NOW SOLD).

I also have a more modern beetle brooch, bejewelled with green rhinestones. He’s another behemoth of the insect world—he’s 58 mm (2 1/4 inches) long, not quite up to the size of Daddy Longlegs above but giving him a run for his money!

Vintage jewelled beetle brooch. For sale in my Etsy shop. (NOW SOLD)

I bought him because I love the colours. Green beetles always make me think of the amazing dress made for the famous actress Ellen Terry, when she played Lady Macbeth: goodness knows how many thousand green beetle carapaces were sewn on to the dress. The stunning painting by John Singer Sargent of Ellen Terry wearing the dress is in the Tate Gallery in London.

Ellen Terry as Lady Macbeth, by John Singer Sargent, 1889.

The dress itself is on display at Terry’s house, Smallhythe Place in Kent, under the stewardship of the National Trust.

My third piece is a gorgeous fluttery butterfly which has settled on a silver ring: blue and green guilloche enamel decorates the wings, and the two antennae bend back towards the body.

Vintage guilloche enamel and silver butterfly ring. For sale in my Etsy shop. (NOW SOLD).

The ring is not marked with a maker but it is similar to Scandinavian examples so I wonder if that region might be its homeland. (I had a pair of enamel butterfly earrings by Norwegian silversmith Hroar Prydz, but unsurprisingly they sold pretty quickly—they were absolutely gorgeous!)

Hroar Prydz enamel butterfly earrings. Sold in my Etsy shop. Sorry ladies! (NOW SOLD).

UPDATE 19 August 2014:

I now have a beautiful small Hroar Prydz butterfly brooch for sale in my shop:

Horar Prydz small utterfly brooch, silver, vermeil and guilloche enamel, 1950s, for sale in my Etsy shop.

Hroar Prydz small butterfly brooch, silver, vermeil and guilloche enamel, 1950s, for sale in my Etsy shop. (NOW SOLD).

UPDATE 26 August 2014:

I’ve gone bug crazy! I have another insect brooch in my shop now, a lovely little sterling silver and turquoise insect brooch. I think it might be from the US – Southwestern/Native American/Navajo jewellery. Wherever it comes from, it’s a buzzy delight!

Sterling silver and turquoise insect brooch, for sale in my Etsy shop. (NOW SOLD).

Raptors in and around our village

Jul29

The night before last I was awake between 3 and 5 am (I know that much as I heard the village church clock strike 3, then 4, then 5 … Oh the joys of insomnia!) and just before 4 am a tawny owl (Strix aluco) perched up very close to our cottage and started its call.

Tawny owl (Strix aluco). Photo by Martin Mecnarowski.

As it has been so hot recently all our windows are wide open, so it sounded like it was almost on top of us: I think it might have been in our neighbour’s alder tree. Anyhow, after a few initial single screechy ‘ooh-eee’ calls (can’t think how to describe them better), it started up with its regular ‘Hoo hoo-hoo-hoo-hoo’ call, the one that we in the UK often call ‘twit-twooo’. (This BBC video starts with the ‘twit-twoo’ and ends up with a screechy one, if you were curious to know what my pathetic attempts at owl call transcription actually sound like).

Within a couple of minutes a second, distant tawny owl was responding, setting up a nice duet. And then a third joined in, somewhere between the other two—not as loud as the first but louder than the second. And he sounded like he had a bad case of sore throat: his croaky calls didn’t add much to the melody. The three of them sang to each other (or more realistically, disputed territories vocally) for about ten minutes, and then, as abruptly as it had started, it stopped. I still didn’t get to sleep though.

Tawny owl chicks. Photo by Artur Mikołajewski.

Tawny owl chicks. Cute overload! Photo by Artur Mikołajewski.

I have a real fascination for raptors of all kinds. We are lucky to have various kinds living in and flying over our village. We frequently see buzzards (Buteo buteo) and occasionally sparrowhawks (Accipiter nisus) flying over—the sparrowhawks hunt quite low over our garden and I have had some amazingly close encounters.

Buzzard (common buzzard, Buteo buteo). Photo by Arend.

Sparrowhawk (Accipiter nisus) in flight, seen from underneath. Photo by Christian Knoch.

Most exciting of all are the red kites (Milvus milvus) that we have started seeing in the last four years or so.

Red kite (Milvus milvus). This stunning bird has a two metre wingspan. Photo by Thomas Kraft.

These magnificent birds used to be common in the UK—so common that they used to scavenge for scraps on the street of medieval London—but were so relentlessly persecuted over the centuries that their numbers dwindled to a handful of breeding birds in mid Wales by early 1900s. Reintroductions using European birds started in Wales and a little later in the Chiltern Hills in the UK, followed by other projects around the country, and these have been a great success: the red kite population is increasing and their distribution across the UK is spreading.

We waited and waited for our first sighting round these parts. A friend told us he had seen one in Dorset. Then in February 2006 great excitement when Chap saw one circling over an ‘A’ road about three miles from here. But the day were were hoping for—seeing a red kite over our own village here in south-west Wiltshire—finally came on 19 April 2010. That was a red letter day indeed for our nature diary. Since then we have seen them regularly—so regularly in fact that we hope they are breeding nearby, rather than just passing through.

We once were lucky enough to see a kite and a buzzard flying in the same thermal, and we were able to compare sizes: the buzzard is a big bird, but next to the kite it was dwarfed.

Welsh Kite Trust website

Royal Society for the Protection of Bird (RSPB) website

British Trust for Ornithology (BTO) website

Goat Island Iced Tea

Jul25

As it is a blazing hot day, yet again, I thought a cooling drink might be in order … Be warned, it is boozy. Very boozy.

In 2008 Chap and I had a wonderful six-week holiday in New Zealand. We stayed with my family in Wellington, and then did a tour around North Island in a campervan (nicknamed The Nostromo by us).

We both adore swimming and snorkelling, so a visit to the marine reserve at Goat Island (properly titled the Cape Rodney-Okakari Point Marine Reserve) was a must.

The beach at Goat Island marine reserve, with Goat Island in the distance. Photo by Inglenookery.

There is a lovely camping spot nearby, and we spent a couple of days there. The weather was not too clement, and the sea was very choppy and visibility was not too good, and on top of that the fish stayed away. One evening during that stay we walked from the campsite to a great restaurant: Leigh Sawmill Cafe. Before the meal I had the most moreish aperitif, Goat Island Iced Tea, a cocktail made with five (!) white spirits: vermouth, gin, white rum, tequila and Cointreau, topped up with ginger ale. The food was delicious, and the wine list introduced us to Hyperion Syrah (we liked it so much we later visited the vineyard at Matakana and bought a couple of cases). Needless to say, we staggered back to the campsite—luckily most of it was downhill.

We loved Goat Island so much that we visited again during our trip, and stayed at the same campsite. The sun shone for us on our second visit, and the snorkelling was amazing. As there is no fishing allowed in the area—commercial or of any kind at all—the fish are incredibly numerous, both in species and numbers. They are also bold and unafraid. We swam with groupers and rays and blue mau mau (also called blue cod, Parapercis colias). We dined and drank again at the Sawmill. Again, I had the Goat Island Iced Tea. Again, we rolled home. Happy days.

Blue maumau at Goat Island marine reserve.

Blue mau mau (Parapercis colias) at Goat Island marine reserve. Photo by Inglenookery.

I tried to get the recipe from the barman but quite understandably he wasn’t about to give away his trade secrets. I knew the ingredients from the description in the wine list, so I decided to try to recreate it back in Blighty. This isn’t a bad approximation:

Goat Island Iced Tea

50 ml vermouth

50 ml gin

50 ml white rum (such as Bacardi)

50 ml tequila

50 ml Cointreau

50 ml fresh lime juice or a good glug of lime cordial (I like Rose’s)

500 ml dry ginger ale (not ginger beer—that makes the drink too sweet)

Mix in a jug. Serve in tall glasses with lots of ice. I bung in some lime wedges and/or mint leaves too. Enjoy!

Inglenookery

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