Recently stayed in Golspie for a week for my father-in-laws 70th, they have a house up there, it was bloody lovely. Hot as the med, clear seas. So bright and still, it was like an aquarium, i could wade up to my chest with a net and swipe marine creatures from the sandy bottom and amongst the gardens of bladder wrack to impress the kids with.
Best thing I got was a bobtail squid, or ‘little cuttle’. Quite impressed with my catching abilities on that one. Kept changing colour in the net, getting black and angry. Then when released, it fired out a burst of ink and then instantly changed colour to be invisible against the sand, jetting off at high speed leaving an inky ghost of its own shape hanging in the water. Amazing to watch. Also pipefish, baby flounders, brown shrimp, opossum shrimp, scorpion fish and crabs. One of my best mornings ever.
Also lots of seals and a couple of ospreys. Nice times.
As for wildlife, Ive got a fair bit in my garden in London, so wont hear the city done down too much.
Ive had sparrowhawks in the sycamore, peregrine falcons being mobbed by swifts overhead, packs of squirrels and foxes runing riot, wheeling flocks of parakeets, a heron landing on my fence, a purple hairstreak and various species of dragonfly and damselfly checking out my pond, a song thrush smashing snails to bits on my lawn, hordes of goldfinches gorging on the milk thistles, blackcaps and jays flitting furtively about in the canopy, wrens and blue tits nesting in the understory.
Also get little egrets, cormorants, mandarin ducks and kingfishers down the river in the local park behind my house.
Its a lot more than I see in much of Britain’s desolate and raped countryside.
Some of the countyside is lovely of course, every year i go with a bunch of mates to wild camp for the weekend in a plot of wood in the weald that my dad bought years ago when his dad died. The weald is amazing. Highlight this year was when everyone else had crashed about 7 in the morning and me and one intrepid pal went for a stimulant-fuelled wander amongst the glistening dew and sunbeams of the glades and rides and we stumbled across a huge red deer (not often found in the weald) that bolted through the open wood just ahead of us with incredibly touching and profound grace, then it was gone, and just the buzzing of hoverflies pollinating the heather again.
