The Arrowsmith household experienced a plague of slugs in the humid weather lately. Recently, owing to a strange ‘improvement’ in the collection of food-recycling bins – a complete absence for a couple of months – our resident spiders have been grateful for a glut of big, fat, black houseflies. Doubtless it was welcome, as throughout the British Isles any creature dependent on a diet of insects has experienced a period of austerity.
Migratory birds arrived to discover their usual welcoming feast hadn’t been delivered on time. The seasons then failed to cater, so the birds’ ‘get up and go’ got up and went. Swifts, Swallows and Martins didn’t swoop low over meadows where there was no bug-buffet.
Arrowsmith’s summer dusks featured almost no bats. This month’s sad illustration emphasises that no gnats equals no bats. This lack of tiny prey might seem to be insignificant – and possibly even welcome. You may well be delighted summer’s picnics weren’t shared with wasps as much as in years gone by. Holidays in Scotland free of midges! But what we see as a pesky nuisance is often the main course for creatures we enjoy seeing in all seasons at all times of day and night.
In years gone by it’s been easy to find owl-pellets to show to a child, but not so this year. Is something missing in the food-chain which means owls aren’t catching harvest mice?
It’s not only the changes affecting insects, animals and birds which have been noticeable to countryfolk. This year it’s seemed fallow ground, roadside verges and almost any area of untended land have filled with prolific yellow eruptions of ragwort. We know farmers face challenges in crop yields, but when weeds appear to be gaining where harvests are disappointing, we could be forgiven for thinking we’re being punished by the uncontrollable behaviour of the natural world because we’re to blame for climate change!
When the Cotswolds were settling back to peace and predictability following the Second World War, and before new fears were prompted by the Cold-War of the nineteen sixties, Arrowsmith was taken to Sapperton woods for a picnic. Back then children were dressed in outfits which exposed their legs to sun, rain and fresh air. This meant ‘bus rides prickled the backs of one’s thighs with the strange pile of the upholstery, a walk in the countryside usually lacerated knees and shins with brambles, and mothers taught their children dock-leaves would soothe skin fizzing from nettles.
At Sapperton, Arrowsmith’s grandmother spotted a wood-ant mound. She recommended it as a perfect seat on which Arrowsmith could enjoy the picnic…
In the Cotswolds we’re well supplied with several types of ant. Black Garden Ants inhabit nests under stones and decking of gardens both in town and country. Their winged adults swarmed last month, but generally they don’t bother small children on picnics. Indeed, they ‘farm’ aphids, stroking and ‘milking’ them for their sugary secretions. Out in the countryside a similar ant – the Yellow Meadow ant – builds ant hills and will bite if disturbed. Back in your garden, with colonies under stones, Red Ants are more aggressive and will attack en-masse if they decide they are threatened, and their stings are surprisingly painful for both adults and children.
But the ants Arrowsmith’s grandmother inflicted on her unfortunate, ignorant grandchild were Southern Wood Ants, which build mounds from twigs, leaves and pine-needles. They both bite and spray formic acid. They are amongst the largest ants in Britain, and their nests can be seen in Siccaridge Wood, near Daneway Banks nature reserve. Just don’t sit on them.
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