By: Vague
Out here I am surrounded by, immersed in and live and breathe nature. I lose track of the amount of times in the day I pause to watch, listen and experience different threads of this oh-so-rich tapestry.
Take today, for example; as I’ve been going about my business, I’ve been recording all the little pieces of this vast puzzle, just so I can share them with you.
I woke early today, it was cold and the sun had yet to rise. As I lay in my ever so tasty down sleeping bag I could hear two stags across the glen roaring their challenges. I made up the fire, ready for the spark that would set it alight and in the greyness of the pre-dawn I took my camera and went to see if I could get any photographs.
Returning to my shelter, I saw a pair of ravens starting their day in the pink glow of a beautiful sunrise.
I lit the fire and noticed that the frying pan I had used to gently fry apples, sugar and honey in for my steamed pudding, had been cleaned and indeed violated by the mouse who lives in the northwest corner of the shelter. I made a mental note to ensure all pans were cleaned and hung up from now on.
As I sat eating my breakfast, the robin who has become my constant companion appeared and started going over the shelter walls, inside and out, in search of the tasty insect treats that live in them.
Just as I finished eating I heard a woodpecker drumming, I knocked on the bench I was sat on in imitation. Shortly afterwards he or she came to investigate, sitting in the dead oak to the east. Satisfied I wasn’t muscling in on his insect patch, it carried on tip tap tapping, down the gorge.
Today I needed to refill my water bags, and also planned on collecting blackberries for an apple and blackberry crumble (with custard) , so I finished my pint of tea and set off on the ten minute walk down the hill to the burn in the glen below.
On my way I saw three buzzards catching thermals coming off the mountain, gaining height, calling to one another. Closer to me a treecatcher lived up to its name, clambering up and spiralling around a huge oak.
Nearly at the final part of the descent a tiny lizard scurried under a rock, in case I try and catch him. A few steps further and a frog hopped into the deer run I use as a path before disappearing, like his reptilian counterpart, under some more rocks.
The storm I mentioned recently brought down an oak right next to where I gather my water from. Beside it I could see where a deer had slept recently, putting my hand on the crushed bracken and grass I realised it was still warm; I had obviously blundered along in my berry collecting, oblivious to its presence. I brushed off the sticks that clung to my hand and continued on.
After collecting my blackberries and filling my water bags and bottle I went down to the shoreline to see if anything had been washed up in the storms.
I noticed very large deer slots just before the beach; a stag had trotted this way within the last few hours. I resisted the urge to track him and stuck to my plan of a spot of wombling. The tracks did remind me of something though so, after my beach combing, during which I saw cormorant, herring gulls and signs of otters; both spraint and where they had been feeding, I went to the spot where I had seen wild cat tracks. The tracks were still there, but nothing new, but then it has been quite dry recently.
On my way back to camp I spotted a pair of eider ducks out on the water. When I had my cup of tea and lunch prepared, I sat writing in my journal. A strange high pitched shrieking began from the opposite side of the shelter, where there are several large rocks covered in moss. This shrieking continued, then a family of shrews appeared, scuttling about also clearing the shelter of insects. I sat and watched for a while before being distracted – first by the arrival of a wren; competing with the shrews for the spiders and flies, then another competitor in the form of the wood mouse I mentioned earlier.
Later I left the shelter to enjoy the sun, and cut some logs to make the walls of the bed I am crafting. I saw the woodpecker again, small and lesser spotted, then a chorus of flying fluff balls in the forms of greater, blue, coal and long tailed tits. They fly from tree to tree, constantly chattering and peeling away bark, searching for sustenance. The flurry of birds headed up the gorge towards my camp, but I stayed lower, cutting my logs and exploring the several little gorges heading off the main one.
Up one of these I found some sort of den, or burrow. Too small for a badger, or fox, but too large for a rodent. I have logged the place in my memory and will return at some point dawn or dusk to see who lives here; could it be a wild cat? We shall have to wait and see.
Late in the afternoon I have finished my gathering and head back to start my tea. I pause to watch a distant golden eagle soaring above the mountains effortlessly.
During the preparation of my haggis and mash and pie and custard, the deer start roaring in earnest once more. After, I go outside to look at the stars before the moon rises and startle something close by. I’m not sure what it was, its disappearing footsteps were heavy though; either badger or fox is my guess, I’ve seen both since I’ve been at this camp, and both within ten feet of me.
A bat flies across my patch of starlit sky, pipistrelle; there are also bigger bats here too. Above the deer across the glen, an owl starts hooting. I go back into the warmth.
As I am preparing for bed I hear the harsh cry of a heron down by the shore, then something screeching down the gorge; another owl, this one not tawny is my thought.
I am now in bed once more, writing this. I hope it has given you an idea of the wealth of wildlife I currently live amongst. Things scurry about their night’s work outside and far overhead I hear a skein of geese honking to one another, headed south.
I haven’t really touched on all the thousands of insects I see; many species providing food for the larger creatures I have discussed. Everything out here is part of the vast web of survival, big and little, humble or grand. It reminds me of a scene in Labyrinth, where Sarah is chalking arrows to indicate her direction; tiny people move them, hidden from her but a part of the whole.
Nature doesn’t compromise and neither can I afford to. Our modern, civilised lives are full of such compromises, out here it has to be different.
Imagine the day I have just described, it could have been very different with only one or two little changes. Say, for example, I hadn’t walked as far when I was collecting my firewood the previous day and had settled for damp logs (they’d dry out over the fire after all). Then I go to get my water. The weather is good so I don’t wear my ventile, but a sudden storm blows in (and this happens a lot) and I get soaked through. Wet and now cold, as the temperature drops, I make it back to the shelter in time to resurrect the fire. But I only have damp logs, and I am already feeling the insidious tendrils of the first signs of hypothermia…
Do you see my point? I don’t make these compromises out here and it leads me to ponder whether we should in our ‘everyday’ lives? Sure, there are times we have to do x to get to y before we reach z, but we should never lose sight of the bigger picture. In this I think nature teaches us a valuable lesson.