Wet and wildness

WATER

 

What would the world be once bereft of wet and of wildness , let them be left…

Gerard Manley Hopkins, 1881.

I once met a man dancing the streets of Barcelona completely naked. On his back the words were painted, ‘Somos Agua’, we are water. Water is the most precious resource on the planet, because we are made up almost entirely of water and no living thing can survive without it. You may think that’s ok, because we live on a blue planet. Well, our planet is not as watery as it appears. 98% of the water on its surface is salty seawater and unfit for consumption. Most of the rest is locked away in icebergs. Only 0.2 % is available in our freshwater river systems. This system is a closed one. Water gets recycled in it, but no extra water is available should we consume too much. But Britain is so rainy I hear you cry! The trouble is, we are so wasteful with water. As society’s become developed, industry and agriculture place extra pressure on our drinking water reserves.

Water in Industry and Agriculture

It takes 10 litres to make a newspaper

27 litres to make a plate of French fries

250 litres to make a glass of orange juice

20,000 litres to make the body of a car

The naked man was protesting against the proposed water development systems in Spain which are taking precious water from the natural ecostystems of Pyrenees and the River Ebro Delta.Huge pipelines all the way to the south of Spain, a thousand miles to feed the growing golf courses and polytunnels, which supply us, with goods.

Indeed, 68% of water use goes to agriculture, which also pollutes our waterways with 90,000 tonnes of phosphorous and 1.2million tonnes of nitrogen.With a global population growth rate of 80 million people a year, many leading environmentalists believe the next world war will be fought over water.

Loss of wetlands

Britain used to be soggy all over, providing homes for countless creatures from otters to dragonflies, salmon to snipe. Whenever we turn on the tap, and bring this precious resource into our lives, we are taking it away from all of the other creatures which depend upon it..

Since 1945 we have lost

three quarters of our reed bed,

two thirds of our grazing marsh

94% of bogs

Wasting water

Every week each person in their home uses more than 1000 litres.

26,000 litres a year wash our clothes

Most (one third) goes down the loo 6 litres every time we flush

What a wasteful thing to do with the most precious resource in the world!

Appreciate Water

My Zimbabwean friends know the value of water. They walk a long way each day to fetch water and because of this use it carefully and sparingly on what matters. We have lost sight of how important it is because it flows so readily. But take a moment to appreciate water each day, it sparkles like diamonds and is more precious.

Suddenly he came to the edge of a river- never in his life had he seen one before. All was a-shake and a-shiver, gleaming and sparkling, the mole was enchanted.

 Kenneth Grahame, Wind in the Willows.

Seven ways to save water

The most important message from today is to THINK about water and how you personally use it, and try to reduce consumption and WASTE of water wherever you can.

1. put a brick in your cistern
2. drink water not fruit juices/soft drinks which take much more water to produce: much better for you as well and use water filters rather than bottled drinking water – www.freshwaterfilter.org.uk
3. take a shower not a bath (I shower with my baby – she loves it!)
4. never use a sprinkler – try a water can!
5. use short bursts of water when brushing teeth – don’t leave the tap running
6. only use the washing machine for a full load
7. eat organic!

Finally, if you want to help the needy in the world who are without clean water, contact www.wateraid.co.uk or for more info on water saving contact the Centre for Alternative Technology for more help on 01654 702 400 www.cat.org.uk

Feel positive

Don’t let all this get you down. Being eco-active should make you feel positive and uplifted, because you are doing something important for the planet and taking responsibility for your life. The naked man in Barcelona was dancing. If I ever need reminding that water is precious, I think of him!

Sasha Norris

Furzy Pig Rescue!

This time it was a hedgehog, on absurdly long legs, running across the lane at Orcop, chased by two carrion crows, baying for blood. It was a valiant creature, only three inches or so long and a perfect miniature of Mrs Tiggy Winkle. It ran for its life, and being outnumbered and considerably outsized was athletic and impressive in its efforts. I stopped the camper, noted the exact position of the hedge hog on the road and and picked up the little brown ball of pins, carefully. I phoned my friend Hugh Warwick, who has had lifelong love of the prickly fellows, and recently published The Hedghog Dilemma. We debated its chances.  

The road was in a kind of trench, the ground height being above the tarmac by about three foot. The hedge towered above us, another eight foot, thick and inpenetrable. Beyond was a field of grasses, in full bloom, hayfever central. I nosed around, looking for mum and nest, or siblings, seeking beneedled creatures in a living haystack.

I had a choice, release the baby hedgehog on one side of the road or the other, hoping it would be reunited with mum, or 'rescue' it, a difficult option because always, always, animals are better at being mummy's to their offspring than humans are. I called too, the Wildlife Hospital at Gloucester. Something was wrong for this little hog to be wandering the by ways of Britain in board daylight. Between us, and between moving the car out of the way of irritated drivers, we made the executive decision that her best chances of survival were in my care.

 So nestled in my airing cupboard is another ancient creature of the night to add to my collection. Hope, as the children have named her, has been checked over by Maureen. local hedgehog rehabilitation expert from Ross-on-Wye, and is in good health. She goes from strength to strength eating Hill's Science Diet cat food, a luxury meat mousse which she laps fervently with her long tongue. In between meals, she sleeps tucked up in a fleece bedding.

 Hedgehogs are officially the cutest animals in the world.

Sasha x

Athene: gleaming eyed Goddess of the night

Its 4am and Athene will be waiting for me. She will have been there  all night, sitting bolt upright, eyes staring. She doesn’t speak, or make any sound, but she hears everything, like it’s amplified through festival speakers. I am her mother  and she is a beautiful, but strange child. She is waiting for her meal of raw meat, which she will swallow without chewing. She rise up in a dance of defense when I go to her, threatening to  attack. In case you haven’t guessed, Athene, is an owl.

I received a call last Monday morning for my local vet. They had a tawny owl chick in the surgery, and could I please collect and care for it. I have been mum to, among many others, lambs, and puppies, humans and  jackdaws, mice and even ants. I have not had the privilege of looking after an owl. I found the prospect slightly daunting. Athene however, trusted me, and gazing up with her enormous inquisitive eyes, gladly ate the meal I offered her of chopped up day old chicken meat. Ten days on, I can report she is probably the best behaved baby I have had.

Her wings are growing, she is learning to fly, and one day soon she will return to the wild..

Owls are much better at being parents to baby owls than I am. I am a diligent and loving adoptive , mum but her own mum would have known how to hunt mice, where to look for the best prey, the flight paths through the woods,  how to climb up a vertical tree trunk, using your wings and talons and crucially when to sleep.

I feed Athene very early in the morning and late at night and sometimes during the day. When I feed her in daylight hours, she is full of sleep, her huge brown eyes blinking at me. At night she is alert and ready for action, but we are all out for the count. It must be hard being an owl baby in a human family.

One problem that can make life difficult for tawny owl families and increase the risk of chicks finding themselves on the ground, is lack of suitable nest sites. Grandfather trees with wide trunks with hollow interiors are rare. So, after making ten nest boxes for smaller birds early this year, Salvador (aged six) and uncle David are going into production making owl nest boxes. Whatever fate befalls Athene when she leaves us for the wild night, she won’t be short of a suitable home to raise her chicks, when the time comes.

It is against the law to keep a tawny owl chick unless you intend to release it. It is also illegal to do anything to that chick that may hinder its release to the wild. That of course would include taming her too much.  It’s a fine line between leaving her alone so that she doesn’t habituate to humans and giving her some company and stimulation so that she doesn’t become bored. So it’s a relief that Athene is not scared by my presence and will happily eat her dinners, but maintains a healthy disdain for being picked up or bothered. She clacks her beak which when she arrived all fluffy and hunched over seemed a little pitiful as a defence, but now she is bigger and sat on her perch she is more menacing. She also extends out her wings and dances from side to side if she feels really threatened, which is an impressive sight. She is in a way, both baby and heroine, frightened sometimes and also a little frightening with her huge staring eyes, powerful talons and that confidence only true predators hold.

I look forward to the day when Athene will fly free into the woods surrounding our home. Until then I will go to her in the early hours, called by her gleaming eyes and fluffy head. With her intelligence and courage Athene has won our hearts and admiration. She is well-named.

Also this week, Phoebe, our sheep, who we raised from an orphaned lamb into a fine ewe has become a mummy.... but that is another story, soon to be told.

Sasha x