The Guardian
Country diary 50 years ago: A wild week in the Cairngorms
Originally published in the Guardian on 27 February 1967
THE CAIRNGORMS: It didn’t seem at all strange to discover a bedraggled reindeer sheltering from the storm just inside the entrance to the chair-lift the other day, for the wind was like a knife and the ski-runs like tilted ice-rinks. Of course, he might have merely come in for the company – you could see his fellows higher up the snowbound hillside – or he might have been hoping for a chance of something more succulent than the frozen heather roots these creatures seem to live on. But he wasn’t very friendly, responding to a cautious stroking by an angry swing of the head, so I left him standing disconsolate near the ticket office and looking as if he’d lost both Father Christmas and his sledge. I suppose they’re harmless enough although a notice farther down the mountain warns “Beware of Reindeer,” but doesn’t explain why. These were the only wild life we saw in the hills during a wild week, except for the ptarmigan in their white winter plumage hurrying through the snow, and once a handsome pheasant strutting across the track through the Rothiemurchus pines. Indeed, there were days, so fierce the winds, when these popular slopes were even deserted by the humans who normally at this time of year swarm like ants, and one day, especially, when I seemed quite alone in the mountains. Ski-ing that day was out of the question – you needed ice-axe and crampons just to get across the runs – and the wind so strong on the plateau it took you all your time to avoid being blown over the edge. But down by Loch Morlich in the late afternoon the wind suddenly dropped for half an hour, and there was the quiet splendour of purpling hills and a foreground of silvered loch with the birches and pines showing black against a golden sunset like a Chinese painting.
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January was the hottest month on record for Sydney since 1859, and the persistent warmth into February (with many places topping 35C day after day) may topple the New South Wales record of 50 hot days in a row.
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Name: Grey squirrels.
Age: First introduced to the UK in the 1870s.
Continue reading...End UK tax incentives for diesel vehicles, ministers are urged
Campaigners write to chancellor to urge him to end tax breaks and bring in scheme to encourage switch to greener cars
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A group of medical professionals, environmental campaigners and lawyers has written to the chancellor ahead of the budget to demand a change to the vehicle excise duty that they say subsidises diesel cars.
Continue reading...The eco guide to greener salads
The salad shortage focused attention on the failures of our 24/7 dietary culture. But it also provides a chance to rethink the way we eat fresh fruit, veg and green leaves
I’m afraid the lettuce shortage was just the tip of the iceberg. We may have run low on salad leaves but, more worryingly, we were low on empathy for poor southern Spain where flash floods followed by snow wrecked the crop. Our relentless consumer-rights focus meant that the emphasis was clearly on “weather-related supply challenges”, supermarket speak for “My God, we are running out of salad!” Sustaining a dietary culture of 24/7 access to all fresh fruit and veg in all seasons was never going to be easy.
A packed salad uses at least 10 times more energy than a local lettuce
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“The living fabric of the world is slipping through our fingers without our showing much sign of caring,” say the organisers of the Biological Extinction conference held at the Vatican this week.
Continue reading...Brexit brings new questions about investing down on the farm
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That simple fact works against the high levels of investment agriculture minister Andrea Leadsom would like to see in the run-up to a hard Brexit.
Continue reading...Tracks in the snow where carnivores passed in the night
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The previous night’s snowfall had been just right for tracking: about 4cm at dusk, then no more until after light. So I was out early and picked up the first tracks under the beech tree at the bottom of the garden, a stoat. It had been quartering the ground, hunting, but did not make a kill until it reached the large pond. There the tracks suddenly veered; a leap sideways and a few specks of blood on the snow revealed where it had taken its prey, probably a mouse or vole.
Related: Daylight encounter hungry pine marten
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Continue reading...We need a recipe to save the red squirrel | Brief letters
The easiest way to protect the red squirrel (Report, 24 February) is for us to eat the grey ones. The latter are too plentiful and should be easy to trap. Many of us have no problem eating rabbits, so the greys could be a cheap addition to our diet. The bird population would also benefit from a cull of these pests. So, Delia, could we please have a recipe for écureuil à la bourguignonne?
Donald Blow
Kirkcaldy, Fife
• John Harris (What’s the point in building a million new homes if they’re not fit to live in?, 22 February) writes honestly of the difficulties facing new home owners when the rush to build leads to corners being cut. We are also aware of houses being sold leasehold, some with onerous clauses which double ground rent every few years. Caveat emptor.
Brenda Banks
Teignmouth, Devon
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Continue reading...Red squirrels: 5,000 volunteers sought to save species – and help kill invasive greys
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Continue reading...Australia's carp herpes plan dubbed 'serious risk to global food security'
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