Category: Wildlife

Dogging in the Dark

Our little Victorian cottage sits at the top of a semi-rural lane which meanders down to the River Chet, with wood, scrub and marsh all around. You’d think, living where we do, our nights would be as silent as the graves in the churchyard next door. Not a bit of it. Even in the depths of winter, we keep our bedroom window slightly ajar and so our country slumber is often serenaded by a cacophony of sounds from the wild things hereabouts. The song of the tawny owl is both soothing and soporific, whereas the screaming of the horny foxes is eerie and bone-chilling. And then there’s the rustling of small rodents as they feed, out of sight of predators. But most recently, a loud barking has been added to the choir.

At first we thought it was a lost dog – our four-legged friends are as popular as mobility scooters around these parts. But it turns out the barking is the call of a randy muntjac deer cruising for a bit of lovin’ in the boggy thicket. An adult muntjac deer is the size of a labrador and sounds a bit like one too.

We have two species of small deer around us – the muntjac and the Chinese water deer, neither of which is native to these islands. Both were imported from Asia by toffs in waxed jackets – for their sprawling country estates. Inevitably, some escaped into the wild and bred like rabbits. And so it’s all dogging in the dark for these horny creatures – just like the human variety in copses and clearings, lay-bys and car parks up and down the land.

Muntjac
Chinese Water Deer

Flirty Birds and Pesky Pests

Spring is springing, bulbs are sprouting, the sap is rising and mating season is in full swing. The dawn squawk is dominated by flirty birds in the mood for a little lovin’, and love nests are being adorned with clumps of moss ripped from our cottage roof. I guess our feathered friends are doing us a favour, but it’s hard to appreciate that while I’m sweeping up the downy green slime-bombs carelessly dropped all over our front yard.

And after a five-year gap, the moles are back once more to slaughter worms and decimate our lawn. There are reckoned to be as many as 40 million moles in the UK, and judging by the mini-mountains of mole hills poking up through every patch of open ground hereabouts, it seems like most of ’em live in Norfolk. We’ve been tracking their relentless march beneath the nearby playground and our neighbours’ gardens, and now the tell-tale signs of excavation have appeared along one of our garden fences.

Last time, I counter-attacked with organic repellent and coffee grains. This time, I’ve gone all hi-tech with a German-engineered sonic spike. Apparently, moles are virtually blind and extremely sensitive to sound and vibrations. The spike emits sonic pulses and a high-pitched buzz to piss off the pesky pests.

The jury’s out on whether these fancy devices actually work, but so far so good. We’re keeping everything crossed. Come a summer sizzler and sunny wine time, we don’t want the BBQ toppling into a mole hole and sending under-cooked bangers rolling off the grill.

Chedgrave Common

Pigs in the Proverbial

It’s now been five years since we moved out to the sticks. One day we were enjoying city centre living like pigs in the proverbial, the next we were in the smallest cottage in the county surrounded by the stuff. Such is country life in the Norfolk flatlands.

We’ve been invaded by ants, spiders, moles, slugs and rabbits, been charged at by a seriously pissed-off heffer and kept awake by bloodcurdling screeching and the unforgiving dawn squawk. We’ve also endured fierce storms, leaks and the occasional power cut. And like everyone else, we were put under house arrest by a pandemic.

Local wildlife of the human kind is mostly friendly, though. No doubt, the odd blue-crested bigot still lurks in the undergrowth, but they’re an endangered species nowadays.

It’s our sixth move since we met that fateful evening 18 years ago in a West End gay bar, and unless we end up in a maximum security care home for the bewildered, I reckon this’ll be our final resting place. Never did I imagine as a young gay about London town that I would end my days in the middle of nowhere. But I’ve never been happier or more satisfied with my lot. I feel blessed.

Waking the Dead

Recently, our sleep has been rudely disturbed by bloodcurdling screeching coming from outside our bedroom window. It’s really spooky, and loud enough to wake the dearly departed in the hallowed churchyard next door.

We couldn’t think what it could be so we asked around. Friends suggested it might be feral cats indulging in a bit of night-time nookie. We weren’t convinced. We remember well our Bodrum days, when we were regularly serenaded by an ear-splitting cat’s chorus as local litters indulged in orgies of Roman proportions. In any case, feral felines aren’t that common round here. No, this sound was altogether different and more sinister. So I did a bit of Googling, like you do, and it turns out it might be foxes. This is what we heard…

Here’s the thing. While foxes are a familiar sight on the mean streets of London, in all our time as village people, we’ve not once seen one. Plenty of rabbits, hedgehogs, squirrels, mice, rats and even the odd muntjac deer, but never a fox. Clearly, our ginger-furred friends are more elusive than their urban cousins.

Apparently, foxes scream at night for a variety of reasons – mating rituals, marking territory, communicating with other foxes. Having been woken up by that chilling racket, I reckon that’s why people of yore believed in ghosts, ghoulies and things that go bump in the night.

Postcards from Paxos – First Delivery

The Crack of Dawn

We were up at the crack of dawn for our sunrise flight to Corfu. Although we’d booked our seats with TUI, one of the world’s largest travel companies, they’d run out of planes so they hired in some help and we boarded an unmarked Boeing in virgin white. Who were they? No idea but the safety instructions were in Czech (I think). Our journey – flight, taxi, hydrofoil, taxi – passed without incident, and a few hours later we were putting out our smellies and putting away our smalls. Kostas, our handsome nothing’s-too-much-trouble host, had taxied us from the ferry port, chatting ten to the dozen all the way. I was a little alarmed when he called himself a cretin until I realised he meant Cretan, from Crete. More alarming is his habit of driving hands-free along the narrow country lanes.

Upping Our Game

Compared to our last visit in 2022, we’ve upped our game, accommodation-wise. Our pretty digs for the next twelve days are bright, spacious, comfy and clean. Mind you, Greek showers do tend to be on the small side, and we end up wearing the shower curtain while wiping down the business end.

Cock a Doodle Doo

Living in a rural Norfolk village, we’re used to the dawn squawk. But we didn’t reckon on the all-day Grecian-style chorus of bolshie cocks and randy cicadas. So we loll about our warm salt-water pool plugged into Spotify to drown out the racket. It’s a small price to pay for our little slice of paradise.

Luscious Lakka

Paxos is a blesséd isle of endless olive groves and breathtaking views across the Ionian Sea. Luscious Lakka is on the north side of the island, draped around one half of a sparkling, yacht-sprinkled bay. Picture-perfect and taverna-stuffed, the pretty village of alleyways and squares is a relaxed, laid-back kinda place.

They Think It’s All Over

The peace was only broken when the England Football Team reached the Euros final. There wasn’t a spare chair in the village. Sadly, England lost to Spain. “They think it’s all over. Well, it is now,” to echo the famous words of a footie pundit when England won the 1966 World Cup. Liam sank another ouzo, then another, to drown his sorrows.

I had to carry him home.

Eyes to the Right

Another year passes, another joint birthday to mark. These days we prefer doing rather than giving so this year we decided to do a bit more of London by taking in a big wheel, a few sharks and a West End show. First up was the London Eye, the giant Ferris wheel on London’s South Bank and the most popular paid tourist attraction in the land. I’ve ridden the Eye a couple of times before but, remarkably, this was Liam’s first ever flight. He loved it and I’d forgotten just how good it is. Our weather is predictably unpredictable and it was a bit overcast when we joined the international queue. But as our pod slowly glided above the city skyline, the clouds parted giving us an almost picture-perfect panorama. It’s not called the London Eye for nothing.

The Eye’s neighbour is old County Hall, formerly the seat of London’s government but now home to a couple of hotels and a mishmash of attractions, one of which is Sea Life at the London Aquarium. The exhibition occupies much of the basement. The shelves of dusty old archives have been replaced by bubbling tanks of sea creatures swimming about to amuse and amaze the thousands of curious gawpers who pass by each day. It was another first for Liam. And as for the platoons of over-excited school kids who overwhelmed us, I have no words.

Quite rightly, flash photography is forbidden so photo opportunities were limited but we did what we could. There really were sharks – honest.

Lastly, we took our seats for ‘Dear Evan Hansen’, a song and dance show for the digital age. We slipped in just before it reached the end of its West End run. With a theme of teenage angst and anger, it’s very of the moment. While the set and staging were slick and inventive, we thought the big songs were well beyond the cast, particularly ‘Evan’ himself, which was disappointing. Still, the largely youthful crowd lapped it up and gave an enthusiastic standing ovation at the end, so what do we know? And anything that gets young bums on seats gets my vote. At least the bar was empty during the interval.

Mole-opolis

Mole-opolis

Last summer, Mr Mole was that unwelcome guest at a party who refuses to leave. We tried everything – organic repellent, castor oil spray, coffee grains, stomping and wailing too – all to nought. Mr Mole simply moved home to a different corner of our small plot. In desperation, we invested in an industrial strength sonic spike to drive the little bugger out. Despite plenty of hard evidence to the contrary, it worked. Rather than buy a pair of ear plugs, Mr Mole upped sticks to greener, less noisy pastures.

Chances are it’s a lost cause. We’re surrounded by fields and thickets littered with molehills. Flat, wet and fertile, the land serves up a juicy banquet of bugs and grubs – enough to fatten an unholy legion of the pesky pests. Our weekly constitutional takes us across Chedgrave Common, a boggy meadow punctured by muddy mountains of stone and soil, an obvious sign of the city of moles that lies beneath.

This is their party and we are the unwelcome guests.

I’m Not a Pheasant Plucker

When I put food out for the birds, I don’t expect a big fat pheasant to waddle along and scoff the lot. Bold as brass it was. Where’s the pheasant plucker when you need him? I feel a tongue twister coming on.

I'm not the pheasant plucker, 
I'm the pheasant plucker's mate, 
And I'm only plucking pheasants 
'Cause the pheasant plucker's late.   

I'm not the pheasant plucker, 
I'm the pheasant plucker's son, 
And I'm only plucking pheasants, 
Till the pheasant pluckers come.

He might be cock of the walk right now scaring off all the little birdies but, if he’s not careful, he’ll soon find himself hanging in a shed ripening for the pot.

Wasp at the Picnic

Weather in these isles is notoriously unpredictable at the best of times but, all things considered, summer this year has been good. Just as well with all this lockdown business. June was warm and dry, July was wetter and August has been a scorcher so far. Whenever the mercury rises, out comes the BBQ, bangers and burgers. On the hottest day of the year, we popped to the shops for grill grub and, after getting home, threw open the stable door to our little porch. The heat rushed in and the fire alarm went off. We had to unscrew it from the ceiling to get it to stop.

Later that day, as I was flipping the burgers, I stepped on a wasp with my bare foot. Unsurprisingly, this didn’t go down too well with the wasp and the angry little bugger stung me. It was my first time. Until that painful moment, this city boy had never been stung – bitten many times, yes, but stung, no. I didn’t know how I’d react, physically. Thankfully, I didn’t go into anaphylactic shock and have to be rushed to hospital. I did, though, hop around the lawn screaming ‘ouch, ouch, ouch.’

‘Don’t be such a drama queen,’

Liam said before pouring me a large glass of medicinal white.

Holy Moly

Country life brings with it many rewards but one of them isn’t the common or garden mole. Our small rural patch was under sustained excavation from one (or maybe more) of these pesky pests burrowing beneath our feet to mine for juicy worms. The BBQ was in serious danger of dropping down a sink hole, and whole sections of the lawn began to resemble a toy-town Peak District as the industrious mouldywarp (as moles were called in Shakespeare’s day) built little hillocks from the tunnel spoil.

Mole hills are all too common in these parts. The local graveyard is full of ’em. The dearly departed may not mind, but the alive and kicking certainly do. I’ve had dreams of Mr Mole sunning himself on a little deckchair, cocktail in one hand, worm burger in the other; the party guest who never leaves. It’s the stuff of my nightmares – Wind in the Willows it ain’t. So I counter-attacked with organic repellent and coffee grains in the hope he’d get the message and move on to greener pastures. So far so good. I may have won the battle but the war is not over.