Dear Readers, my trail camera has decided to go on strike, bless it: it won’t let me  change the time that it takes photos, and is currently taking them randomly, whenever it feels the urge, rather than taking them at night when it’s meant to. Maybe it’s as fed up with the hot weather as I am, poor thing.  In spite of all manner of messing about (including turning it off and on again, before anybody asks) it is still defunct.

So, I contact the people who make  it (Browning Trail Cameras) and they are very helpful.

They suggest that I not only turn it on and off again, but also that I remove the batteries and sim card, and put them back in again.

Well it was worth a try, but still no luck.

“I think you should send it to us so we can check it’ says the lovely support person.

I check the address and it’s in Birmingham, so not too bad.

I package it up and look again at the postcode. It’s not Birmingham in the West Midlands, it’s Birmingham, Alabama.

I contact the service  person again, explaining that I’m in the UK.

The service person explains that this is the global service centre and there aren’t any others, but he does understand my concerns. However, they will fix the camera (it’s in warranty, unusually for me), and send it back for free.

Turns out that even a tracked parcel to the US is cheaper than getting a new camera, plus I’d always rather get something repaired if I can, having an innate loathing of putting things in landfill. So let’s see what happens, as my little camera wings its way west. Fingers crossed they can fix it, I’ve gotten rather attached to seeing what’s going on in the garden, even if it is mainly my husband doing the watering.

Partial (70%) solar eclipse from 2021 in Halifax, Canada (Photo By Paulo O from Halifax, Canada – Partial Solar Eclipse, 10 June 2021, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=107861703)

Dear Readers, this Wednesday (12th August) there will be the chance to view a pretty impressive solar eclipse – in London it’s expected that the moon’s shadow will cover 91 percent of the sun at 19.13, whilst if you’re lucky enough to be in Cork in Ireland 96 percent of the sun will be covered. Back in 2024 I was in Toronto for a 99 percent eclipse, but this one promises to be pretty exciting. Plus the next full eclipse in the UK won’t be taking place until 2090, by which time I would be 130 years old. Unlikely.

Last time there was an eclipse in the UK in 1990, 70 people damaged their eyesight by looking at the sun, some of them permanently – 40 percent of those people had looked at the sun for less than a minute. So, the recommendation is to use proper eclipse glasses, though good luck with getting them at this point. I bought some for the Toronto trip, and six months after using them I got a recall notice saying they weren’t up to standard, so do be careful.

If you are in the UK and want to watch the eclipse in the company of astronomers, have a look at the site below, which has some details. Many of them will be hanging around with telescopes to watch the Pleiades meteor shower, which is likely to peak later in the evening, so it’s quite the day for sky watchers.

https://ukeclipse.com/

People in Greenland, Northern Russia, Iceland, Portugal, France and Spain will also be able to see the eclipse (a friend of ours should have an excellent view from Iceland). By the time the eclipse happens it will be quite low in. the western sky, so viewing it over water should give a great view. Wherever you are, though, the sky will darken, birds will become confused and it will feel cooler (no bad thing at the moment). The whole event will take just under two hours, with the moon gradually ‘eating’ the sun and then fading away again. Definitely worth finding a spot that suits your personality – I like to sit quietly and listen to the birds, and watch the light gradually fading, but other more extrovert souls seem to like to party. Whatever floats your boat, for sure! For me, an eclipse is one of those occasions when I’m reminded of how small we humans are, and for that I like a bit of silence. But let’s see what happens! And happy eclipse watching, if you’re in the right spot to observe it.

Well, Readers, Grosvenor Square used to be synonymous with the US Embassy, which took up one side of this 18th Century garden. In those days, the gardens themselves were basically London Plane trees and lawn, and the security in front of the Embassy made it quite an uncomfortable place to linger. But recently it was re-opened as a climate-resilient, biodiverse garden, supervised by the London Wildlife Trust, and the brainchild of Professor Nigel Dunnett, who died only a few months before the garden was completed. Previously only one percent of the site was planted, but today that’s up to fifty percent, with 70,000 new plants over 63 species, 80,000 bulbs, 44 new trees and even two ponds. In spite of the drought I thought it was looking splendid, though it’s a bit alarming to see the Michaelmas Daisies in full bloom already – I’d normally expect to see them flowering in September.

The planted areas are supplemented by some very nice play areas and stepping stones made out of the remains of trees that have been removed. Some have also been turned into mini climbing walls for the children, or stumperies for the beetles.

The original statues and memorials are still here: there’s Roosevelt…

….Eisenhower

and behind him the re-purposed US Embassy, now a luxury hotel. It still has an eagle with a 35-foot wingspan on the top, though. The original building was by Finnish-American architect Eero Saarinen, and is Grade Ii listed. If you fancy seeing how the other five percent live, you can have a look here. I had a quick look at a short stay in September in the Grand Premier Grosvenor Suite, and it would have put me back 8,270 pounds, so maybe not.

I was a bit surprised to see a statue of Ronald Reagan – although subsequent presidential incumbents have made me the tiniest bit nostalgic for someone who only planned to shoot down nuclear missiles with lasers, I wasn’t sure that he’d done enough to be celebrated in such a way. But apparently it’s for his role in ending the Cold War, in partnership with Margaret Thatcher. Oh well.

There are now also a couple of ponds, this one in front of the 9/11 Memorial to the people who lost their lives in. the Twin Towers.

And the Plane trees are also magnificent. According to some sites, these are only as old as the Second World War, but if so they’ve done remarkably well in a relatively short space of time.

There are also now toilets and a very nice tea stand, plus lots of comfy places to sit. Whilst sipping a Flat White and taking in the view I saw a woman with a Chow Chow dog. She was chatting away on her phone, oblivious, while I watched the dog walk onto a flowerbed and have a crap. Readers, I saw red, so I walked up to her and told her what the dog had done.

“Did he do Poo Poo”? she asked.

Well, yes he did, so we both stood and looked and eventually spotted the aforesaid, and she moved somewhat reluctantly to clean it up. Readers, I don’t know what has happened, but I seem to be much more direct these days. Maybe it’s my age.

I should also say that I smelled more cigar smoke in my walk from Bond Street Station to Grosvenor Square in ten minutes than I’ve done in the past year.

So I headed off to my next appointment (Foyles Bookshop, because I don’t have enough books, clearly), but on the way I passed Claridges, another nice spot if you’ve got a bob or two to throw around. I can’t find out the price of the most expensive rooms, but a corner suite will set you back 6,375 pounds a night, and the cheapest room is about 1800 quid. Maybe best to visit for afternoon tea instead.

Claridges

So there is no doubt that this is the posh end of town, but Grosvenor Square is now a fine place to sit and watch the world go by. I suspect that when those 80,000 bulbs pop up in spring it will be magnificent, so I shall probably come back for another look. In the meantime, do visit if you’re passing. It’s a lovely transformation.

Dear Readers, I confess to having felt very sorry for slugs and snails this year – it has been so hot and dry that I couldn’t imagine how the slugs, in particular, have been surviving. But clearly there have been a few out on the patio in the evening, because the paving slabs look as if they’ve been scribbled over with a graphite pencil. When the sun shines it sparkles away as if the whole patio was made of mica.

They may be popping out because my husband has been watering the pots with the watering can, and there are always a few dribbles, maybe enough to make moving about bearable. But this weather can take a terrible toll on our molluscan pals (well, my molluscan pals anyway) – this article in The Guardian describes the effects of the 2022 drought, which was nothing like as bad as our current  one. Slugs tend to lay low and bury themselves during hot, dry spells, while snails go into a kind of estivation (summer dormancy). Some will undoubtedly die, and some eggs won’t survive either. Still, one advantage of my garden is the pond, which helps to keep surrounding vegetation green and lush, and my guess is that the slugs and snails are hiding out here during the day, then emerge to silver up the patio once the temperature drops.

I also suspect that they’re eating the remains of the handful of dog food that we throw out for the foxes – though the foxes do a  pretty good job of clearing up, there will always be a few meaty crumbs for the other critters. To complete the circle of life it would be great to see a hedgehog, but no sign yet. I imagine those little guys are having to work harder for their food too.

In 2022, scientists were not too perturbed by the drop in slug and snail numbers – it had been a mild, wet winter, so more of them had survived anyway. That’s what we should be hoping for this year too, not just for the slugs and snails but for all plants and wildlife (and for gardeners, farmers and other people in weather-dependent professions). We rely on snails and slugs to clean up dead plant and animal matter, for all they sometimes take a fancy to our seedlings, so fingers crossed that they bounce back…

Dear Readers, I’ve been thinking about my Mum a lot this week, and I was remembering how she had a whole range of poems that she knew by heart, and would recite to me when I was little and couldn’t sleep. This was one of her favourites, and I can remember her now, taking on the character of the Squire and the Sexton, and gazing off as if the scene was unfurling before her very eyes. See what you think.

Fidele’s Grassy Tomb by Sir Henry Newbolt (1862 – 1938)

The Squire sat propped in a pillowed chair,
His eyes were alive and clear of care,
But well he knew that the hour was come
To bid good-bye to his ancient home.

He looked on garden, wood, and hill,
He looked on the lake, sunny and still:
The last of earth that his eyes could see
Was the island church of Orchardleigh.

The last that his heart could understand
Was the touch of the tongue that licked his hand:
“Bury the dog at my feet,” he said,
And his voice dropped, and the Squire was dead.

Now the dog was a hound of the Danish breed,
Staunch to love and strong at need:
He had dragged his master safe to shore
When the tide was ebbing at Elsinore.

From that day forth, as reason would,
He was named “Fidele,” and made it good:
When the last of the mourners left the door
Fidele was dead on the chantry floor.

They buried him there at his master’s feet,
And all that heard of it deemed it meet:
The story went the round for years,
Till it came at last to the Bishop’s ears.

Bishop of Bath and Wells was he,
Lord of the lords of Orchardleigh;
And he wrote to the Parson the strongest screed
That Bishop may write or Parson read.

The sum of it was that a soulless hound
Was known to be buried in hallowed ground:
From scandal sore the Church to save
They must take the dog from his masters grave.

The heir was far in a foreign land,
The Parson was wax to my Lord’s command:
He sent for the Sexton and bade him make
A lonely grave by the shore of the lake.

The Sexton sat by the water’s brink
Where he used to sit when he used to think:
He reasoned slow, but he reasoned it out,
And his argument left him free from doubt.

“A Bishop,” he said, “is the top of his trade:
But there’s others can give him a start with the spade:
Yon dog, he carried the Squire ashore,
And a Christian couldn’t ha’ done no more.

The grave was dug; the mason came
And carved on stone Fidele’s name;
But the dog that the Sexton laid inside
Was a dog that never had lived or died.

So the Parson was praised, and the scandal stayed,
Till, a long time after, the church decayed,
And, laying the floor anew, they found
In the tomb of the Squire the bones of a hound.

As for the Bishop of Bath and Wells
No more of him the story tells;
Doubtless he lived as a Prelate and Prince,
And died and was buried a century since.

And whether his view was right or wrong
Has little to do with this my song;
Something we owe him, you must allow;
And perhaps he has changed his mind by now.

The Squire in the family chantry sleeps,
The marble still his memory keeps:
Remember, when the name you spell,
There rest Fidele’s bones as well.

For the Sexton’s grave you need not search,
‘Tis a nameless mound by the island church:
An ignorant fellow, of humble lot—
But. he knew one thing that a Bishop did not

Brown Huntsman (Heteropoda jugulans) Photo By iNaturalist Australia user: tjeales – https://www.inaturalist.org/photos/100655395, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=116462164

Dear Readers, just because I’ve finished my BSc doesn’t mean that you’re safe from unusual science stories, and  I couldn’t resist this tale of a scientist trying to determine the fastest spider in the world.

The picture of speedy spiders was put together by Shreyas Kuchibhotla at Imperial College London, and involved collecting over 162 species from field work all over the world, plus a number of spiders purchased from pet shops. Each spider was weighed and then measured as it skittered across A3 or A4 graph paper.

To encourage them to run, they were touched gently with a paint brush. However, tarantulas prefer to stay put if challenged, and so had to be encouraged to move with puffs of compressed air.

The current world record for spider speed is held by the Moroccan Flic-Flac Spider (Cebrennus rechenbergi) which can reach speeds of 1.7 metres per second, but several experts feel that this isn’t fair: the Flic-Flac Spider lives on sand dunes, and when alarmed it rolls itself into a ball and basically tumbles down the hill. Hah! This is not comparable with ‘proper’ spider locomotion, at least according to those who like to use graph paper and a stop watch.

Moroccan Flic-Flac Spider doing the Flic-Flac (Photo By Ingo Rechenberg – Ingo Rechenberg, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=33550488)

Christofer Clemente and his colleagues at the University of the Sunshine Coast in Australia found the current winner – the Brown Huntsman spider (pictured at the top of the blog) reached a speed of 3.6 metres per second. Apparently its legs are long, which is good for speed, but its abdomen is relatively small, so it doesn’t get in the way.

I do wonder, though, how far these speeds  were adjusted for the size of the spider. One little chap, the delightfully-named Orange Goblin Spider (Oonops pulcher) is only .1 milligram in weight, but clocked in at over 20 centimetres per second.

“Nothing could have prepared me for how it practically teleported across the arena,” says Kuchibhotla.

It’s a rather attractive little spider too –  it looks to me as if it’s been carved out of butterscotch.

Orange Goblin Spider (Oonops pulcher) Photo By jtch – https://www.inaturalist.org/photos/451684088, CC BY 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=170977570

So, as we move gently into autumn, maybe there’s a case for putting some grid paper on the floor and digging out the timer on your phone? The house spiders are likely to be making themselves apparent soon, so we may as well gather some data 🙂

The New Scientist article is here 

The research paper is here.

Goodness,  Readers, when I was taking my little  walk along the County Roads yesterday I was very taken with how far the Amaranth, that I first wrote about in 2024, has spread. It seems to grow in virtually no soil at all, and pops forth a great crop of surprisingly toothsome leaves, considering that we’ve had next to no rain for months.

It’s difficult to identify Amaranth to species level – my current plant app suggests that this is Redroot Amaranth (Amaranthus retroflexus) but with only 34 percent certainty, so we won’t stick our neck out. Nor can we be sure how the plant arrived in the County Roads (specifically Huntingdon for any curious botanists out there). One theory is that it arrived with sand, maybe used when the EV chargers were put in. Another is that it came with bird seed. Yet another relates to those tasty green leaves, which are known as callaloo in Caribbean cooking, and could well have come from someone’s vegetable garden or allotment. What is certain is that it is happy here, bless it, and is colonising all sorts of unpromising spots.

Each one of those flowerheads (or ‘panicles’) contains 1000 to 3000 seeds, which can be harvested – the seeds have no outer husk and are rich in protein and several dietary minerals. The grains can also be milled into flower, and used for bread or cakes. Furthermore, the plant is extremely drought-tolerant, and can be grown around the panels in solar farms, providing an easily-harvested and easily-maintained crop. It’s already eaten by many communities around the world – in addition to the callaloo already mentioned, it’s eaten with rice and beans in Brazil, as a salad ingredient in Greece, and the leaves are eaten in India, Vietnam and China. The plant, both seeds and leaves, is also widely consumed in various African countries. It’s something of a star, and here it is, growing in a gutter. Clearly, respect is due to this tough, prolific plant. Maybe it’s no coincidence that the name ‘Amaranth’ comes from the Greek word for ‘unfading’.

Dear Readers, the Painted Lady bonanza continues – whenever I look out of the office window I see at least one or two on the Buddleia, which is fast going over, sadly. I cannot get over how fast and agile these butterflies are, with sometimes a couple circling one another at speed. They also think nothing of  shooing a bumblebee off of a particularly attractive flower. In the past few days they’ve been joined by Red Admirals, Commas, Small and Large Whites and Peacocks. It really feels like a bumper year. It’s even been rumoured that Clouded Yellows are present in large numbers along the South Coast, so I’m keeping an eye open. If you see a bright yellow butterfly at this time of year it’s almost certainly one of these migratory beauties (though beware, there are also Brimstone moths around, which are quite different).

Clouded Yellow ( Colia croceus) Photo By Charles J. Sharp – Own work, from Sharp Photography, sharpphotography, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=51144488

It’s a spectacular year for those plants that can survive it – the rowan trees on the County Roads are laden with berries, which the birds will be glad of later in the year I’m sure…

And there are lots of elderberries about too, these from Cherry Tree Wood…

Plus the Crape Myrtles are doing very well…

I am  trying to plant up plenty of drought-resistant  species in the south-facing front garden, so there’s something for the pollinators once the Buddleia has finished. I’m giving Rudbeckia a go, it seems to attract a lot of bees which is always a good thing. I’m also trying the Verbena cultivar which is less leggy than the typical Bodnante variety.

I’ve stuffed the windowboxes with Mediterranean herbs  – there’s marjoram, oregano and some nepeta. Historically, as soon as I’ve planted cat mint some cat has planted themselves on top of it, but hopefully the precarious nature of the windowsill will deter them a smidge.

Is anybody else re-thinking their garden in view of this year’s drought and hosepipe bans? I’m aware that not everybody has had the kind of summer that we have, but all bets are off for the future, I suspect. I was thinking about getting rid of the buddleia, but definitely not now, regardless of what the RHS say. I’d happily plant more natives, but how many are drought-tolerant enough to survive these conditions? Let me know what you think, and how you’re dealing with the challenges that you face – I’m curious not just about the UK, but I know I have readers in other parts of the world who are also facing climate changes of different kinds. Let’s learn from one another!

And in the meantime, a few more Painted Ladies, because you can never have too many…

Dear Readers, I often love the ‘Quote of the Day’ displayed at East Finchley station, but I was stopped in my tracks by this one: it’s my 25th wedding anniversary in a few weeks, so no wonder my thoughts are often turning to what love means, and what home means, and the intersection between the two. For me, ‘home’ is a feeling comprised not just of a location, but of all the people who make that place a home – the local friends, the people who come to visit, the shopkeepers and the road cleaner and the bus drivers, the people who pour our coffee, and the restaurant where I’ll be celebrating my BSc later today (quick shout out for Table du Marché if any East Finchleyites haven’t discovered it yet).

But having someone who has your back, even when you’re being ridiculous, someone who thinks you’re wonderful even when you’re laying on the sofa with a broken leg, well, that’s a special kind of home. It took me until I was nearly forty to find my soulmate – I am a bit envious of people who married their childhood sweetheart, but then again some people never find the person who is right for them. I never forget how lucky I am, in so many ways, but especially in  this. I think I’d given up on the idea of finding someone to make my life complete, and had instead decided that I was perfectly fine as I was. And maybe you have to reach that point so that the person you team up with adds synchronicity, so that you are cheerleaders for one another’s wildest dreams and ambitions. And so the other person is ‘home’, the ground from which you go out and have adventures, the safe harbour that you come back to. Nothing is forever in this life, but I count myself fortunate to have known this feeling.

And walking back along East Finchley High Road from the station, I thought how lucky we were to have the London Plane trees lining the route, bringing down the temperature and shading us as we walk up the hill. So many people were sitting on the wall having a sandwich or a drink under their cool green branches. I often give the tree trunks a pat as I go past, just to show the trees that I appreciate them. It feels like the least I can do.