losing it

Here's a teaser for you:
What do these animals have in common?  And which is the odd one out?

In this post, I'd like to share a collection of articles that have caught my eye recently.

The first, which hit particularly close to home ('cause it's about puddycats, see) informs us that the Scottish Wildcat seems likely to become a proverbial dodo before the year is out.  Joining the likes of the Japanese River Otter, last spotted in the year of my birth (striking another chord), and seven other life forms declared extinct by the Japanese government alone this summer. A sad, sad state of affairs.

It's largely in consequence of degradation and depletion of natural habitats by humans the world over, of course, which has been happening for many, many decades now. One of the most emotive and well-known examples of this is the rate of deforestation in the Amazon, but there are plenty of others.  I'm sure there are fewer trees, fewer strips of wild common land, fewer spaces to breathe than there ever used to be, just in your very own immediate environs. Try to beat the destruction trend - get (non-invasive) things growing wherever you can!

It seems harder for us to feel we can have any control over the oceans, perhaps. But something surely needs doing.  You'll have heard in recent years about our seas' starkly declining fish populations.  It astounds me to think how much cod still gets consumed (especially in Portugal, as it happens) (and yes, by a hypocritical me), and how cheaply it and other species in similar straits are available, especially in light of this visual from one of the coursera video lectures by Professor Jonathan Tomkin (see earlier post).

How can we continue this way? And yet, it's the content of this article that was real news to me - quite shocking news if you read about the future implications of these hugely decreased plankton stocks.  Exactly why we have 40% less oxygen-producing phytoplankton than we did in 1950 hasn't been established, but add sewage dumping, nuclear weapons testing and vast areas of plastic soup (to name but a few obvious issues) to the overfishing debate and it's clear as day that we need to establish a much less abusive relationship with our precious, far-off, waters.

It's not all absolute doom and gloom, though. Because we can act to improve the situation.  Because we can face it rather than ignore it.  Because there is still a lot of beauty and specialness contained within our world.  Because we can make choices.  Because we have the means to inform those choices much more accurately and easily than any generation before us could ever have dreamed. There is hope.

The Lesula, is our odd one out.  He's also hit the news, but for his existence, not his disappearance.  This quiet, shy, newly-discovered species of monkey lives in the Democratic Republic of Congo and the scientific world didn't know a thing about him until this year.  His fate (along with that of bees, rhinos, tigers, etc. etc. etc... etc. ad infinitum!) doesn't look too promising, either.  But we'll work on it, right?

There's something mesmerising about his face, don't you think?.
Quirky little chap.


It takes all sorts to make a world.

small is beautiful

I'll let you into a secret: I'm a bit of a geek.

I want to find out as much as I can about loads of things.

I mean, not everything, of course (I don't really care too much about who's winning Pop Idol, for instance, or how to paint the perfect nails..), but quite a few things, for sure.

You can't do it all at once, though, can you? Little by little, step by step, and all that.  So a few weeks ago, Wombling (that's me) embarked on an eight-week, part-time eLearning course.  "See what it's like," I thought,  "after all, it's being offered free-of-charge.."

And what is it like?  Properly interesting, that's what! I'm really glad I enrolled.

"Introduction to Sustainability", run by Professor Jonathan Tomkin of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign for coursera.org is pretty damn top, I'd say (assessment logistics/test feedback aside, at least).  You should check out what else coursera have got on offer - there are loads of different courses to choose from.

Anyway, quite apart from introducing me to new materials and concepts (this week I'm just getting to grips with the 'Tragedy of the Commons' - ooh-er, missus!), the course has been reminding me of some great lecture videos off t'interweb.

One of them, an absolute classic which everyone should watch, is this eight-parter (find the other 7 parts through the links on YouTube) all about interpreting statistics, what percentages really represent, exponential growth, and how quickly tiny numbers can have devastating effects.

See, this maths - and its comprehension by the average Joe - is blatantly imperative for the health - nay, the very survival - of ourselves and the planet, don't you rec? Glad you watched it? I was!

And they say small things can't make a difference.


Humbug.




"Inch by inch, life's a synch... Yard by yard it's very hard" - Wombling's mum's wisdom, inherited from I know not where.

"If you think a small thing can't make a difference, try going to sleep with a mosquito in the room!" - Anon.

"Never underestimate the ability of a small group of committed individuals to change the world.  Indeed, they are the only ones who ever have." - Margaret Mead

sustainable housing - nature's way!

With the fresh start of a new school year upon us, it is clearly time to write you a post, to finally start taking this blog thing seriously.
And what better way to kick off afresh than with a story?
I reckon I've got quite a good 'un on my hands, and with any luck (and maybe a little help from you, dear reader) the weeks to come may even provide it with a happy ending.

To set the scene a little, ten days ago we returned home after a week's camping in the Alentejo (which was very lovely indeed). This story starts just before we left, when Nascimento and Mario across the street pointed out that our wisteria could really use a trim (couldn't it always?!) as it was tickling passers by on the pavement...

Well you can't ignore good neighbourly 'advice' like that, least of all when you're trying to be a good ambassador for your country, so, along with the epic task of pruning and re-supporting the rose tree in the back garden (which had pretty much collapsed after someone had cut the fantastic chinese lantern plant away from the other side of the fence) ((luckily some of our own physalis have sprung up and are doing very well)), I hastily hacked away at the wisteria out front, leaving the cuttings in a scooped-up pile just to the side of our front door. We were a bit pressed for time that morning, but I'd be sure to add them to the compost when our holidays were over.
We loaded up the hire car and off we went.
Well, after the epic Easycar/Guerin creditcard/insurance deposit nightmare, that is, but that story's for another time.

On our return from the wilds of Portugal, we noticed that the whirl of dead wisteria cuttings had been hollowed out into a cosy little nest. "Ha-ha!" - we thought - "Cheeky Charlie (our adopted cat friend who we sometimes feed and always talk about, but who is really a feral lone wolf and never quite lets us stroke him) has made himself a new den and will be living even closer by than ever! Sweet!"
And yet, happy as he was to see us (or at least, to be fed), laze around our garden and explore the house a little once more, he never went near the thing. "Must've got too dry and crunchy - a little too prickly for him to lie on, now", I thought.

Not so.

For last Monday morn, upon waking and opening the front door, a very different face greeted us from within the snug. We'd seen her around before, this slinky chestnut siamese, but only occasionally, and only from a distance. She's so beautiful we'd never imagined she could be a street cat, but as the neighbours have since filled us in, her owner died a few years ago and she's not had a home since. She has, however, had several litters, they say.

...Or, rather, several OTHER litters!

For tumbling about with her and periodically mewing in quite the highest pitches you can imagine (to remind you of their adorableness) were three tiny wee fluffballs: one ginger, one black, and one grey and white!

Much as I admired her choice of waste-sourced (a litter in the litter!), sustainable (believe me, that wisteria grows at a rate of knots!) home, I was, of course, much more taken with her gorgeous little bundles of squeak :)

They have already provided us with smiles and stories aplenty (watch this space) and have given me a good few creative projects to work on, too (again, watch this space).

We're so happy the new neighbours moved in! Here's a video taster of the little beasties in action.

Introductions (for they've almost all got names..) will follow in the next post, so stay tuned.

In the meantime, I'd love to hear your stories of unexpected (baby?) animal encounters!  If you've got one, why not leave a comment below?