Corona Virus; a chance to win a free book

The sun has shone perpetually over the last week, with clear blue skies and temperatures high enough to eat (and drink!) in the garden.

And by the look of the activity on the gardening club Facebook page, we're all taking the opportunity to get out and garden. 

Thank you for all your photographs and comments and news; it's a great way to stay in touch while we're isolated in our houses. Please keep it all coming while the gardening club are unable to meet at the village hall.

We are, mostly, the lucky ones, living in the countryside and having gardens to get out into. 

I was giving the dog our alloted 'exercise time' in the lanes around my house yesterday, when I realised how....normal things felt. As always, the birds are singing to establish their terriories, there are skylarks over the fields and songbirds in the garden, the chiff-chaff bright and early this spring, willow warblers near the river and a woodpecker hammering hard over by the woods. Yes the butterflies are back, flitting together in pairs dressed ready for Strictly; orange tips searching out Ransoms, and peacocks that made it through the winter. But these are always the artistic and musical accompaniments to my walks and gardening routine. The only difference that was really noticable was that, as  I passed serveral gardening club members, we had to stop for a shout, rather than a chat. 

hare

I might be wrong, but it seems farmers, who mostly work alone or with their family members, are keeping busy, if not in pocket! In the field next to my house, neighbouring farmer Jason, has ploughed and sown his barley, as he did last year, the red kites losing the battle of the air currents to a gang of crows, just like they always do.   We  can chat safely, separated safely by the thickness of bank and hedge. He's happy for me use the field to walk the dog, now that I can't go to my friend's field for our daily 'dog meet'. But that suggestion, I'm sorry to say, was a howling failure. Luci, always curious, found a hole in the hedge and spent ten minutes racing back and fore across the Rhydlewis lane, as I raced in muddy boots towards the gate to get her on the lead. Two cars crawled by, and she obeyed the 'sit for the car' instruction she'd been previously indoctrinated with, coming up to me on the bank, separated by barbed wire, while they passed. 


Apart from adventures with growing puppies, I can't believe my luck. My heart goes out to people living in flats, watching the sun move round the sky from their windows. 

First of the cowslips

But towards the coast things may not be so grand. The spring holiday season has begun, but there are no holiday makers. The collapse of the tourist industry around Cardigan Bay is something that will devistate this year's finances for restuarants and cafes, sightseeing tour oporatiors and water-sports instructors. 

Whether we are forced to down tools, or are relishing more time for gardening, the lockdown gives us such a great chance to observe what nature is doing and grab the opportunity to properly slow down, open our eyes and see nature at her spring's work right in front of us.

a magical yew tree

I've been reading the latest book by Simon Barnes, the naturalist and twitcher, Rewild Yourself...23 spellbinding ways to make nature more visible (Simon and Shuster 2018).  It's a great read for anyone interested in nature, but especially those who would like to know a blackbird's song from a robin's, and a red admiral from a painted lady…but don't yet. Now's your chance to get wild.

River Teifi with Coracles

Barnes uses magic to unlock nature in this book; magical spells from Harry Potter, the Narnia books, Shakespeare, Wallace and Gromit and even Rudyard Kipling, al of which help magic-up nature  to people who have never really been able to see it.  The  23 chapters have titles like The Magic Tree, The Magic Trousers, The Snake-charming Spell, Time Travel, Reading the Secret Signs, The Magician's Library and Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them. 

A bit of Hogwart Magic

Barnes says...Don't seek health; seek wrens. Don't go looking for eternal life; go looking for birds. Don't set out on the track of wellness and mindfulness; set out on the track of deer. 

He uses the example of runners that jog past him in the park. I give a cheery wave, but it's ignored...they've filled their ears with music to make up for any shortfall in the wild world.  
Barnes's book helps you take off the blindfold and the ear plugs that have been impeding you.  He takes you out in a rowboat, gets you plunging your face into the sea, makes you stare half a mile away through binoculars and teaches you several 'summoning spells' all in the aid of making hidden wildlife appear before your very eyes and ears.

The Bowl Nature Reseve

I think my eyes were first opened, and the ear plugs thrust away, when I discovered The Bowl, a tip of derelict land near my old house in Bristol that is now a nature reserve. That's a story for another time, another blogpost.

Right now, I have a new copy of his book to give away. To win Rewild Yourself  by Simon Barnes, all you have to do is email me at ninahare00@googlemail.com. Please write one or two sentences telling me why you think you should be sent the free book.  And don't forget, if you think you are already wide-open to seeing nature, that it's light enough to post off to a townie you know and love, to brighten their life as they cope with isolation on the tarmaced and paved streets.

The winner will be announced next month. 

In the meantime, think about what Barnes is saying...even in the twenty-first century you can be where the wild things are. There days, non-human life always seems to be just over the horizon, just beyond the threshold of our understanding, just a little bit short of our awareness––but even with the smallest alteration all this can change. The lost world can ber found; the hidden creatures that share our planet can be brought before us glowing in  gold and blue and scarlet.