Wildlife

Behold A Cold Horse

by Enormous on November 9, 2009

It’s so cold here at the moment. Not great for the young foal that was born last week in the icy field adjacent to the recreation ground on Lansbury Drive.

He must be wondering why he suddenly finds himself in such frosty conditions when only a few days ago he was warm and snug in a much cozier environment.

When we passed him this morning, Audrey looked at me as if to ask, ‘When are the horses going to be stabled for the winter?’

‘When the evil farmer decides they’ve suffered enough.’ I told her.

I know horses are fairly hardy creatures – and I am certainly no farmer – but it seems to me that a newly-born foal should already be stabled. But what do I know?

‘The horses are cold,’ a small Asian boy observed as he passed us on his way to school. ‘It’s time they were hibernating.’

‘Horses don’t hibernate, little fellow,’ I informed him, trying to be helpful.

‘Oh yes they do,’ he replied. ‘And monkeys.’

‘The only animals that hibernate in this country are dormice, hedgehogs and bats,’ I continued.

‘Vampire bats?’

‘No.’

‘Frankenstein bats?’

‘I’m afraid not. Just ordinary bats.’

Silence. Then: ‘You’re weird.’

I just can’t win.

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Dog's Fog Jog Hog Shock

by Enormous on February 10, 2008

It was very foggy at 8:am this morning when Audrey and I were jogging around the park.

About half-way around, I noticed that she was no longer following me; she had stopped to inspect something underneath one of the wild rosebushes that border the dilapidated tennis courts. She was only about 10 metres behind me along the path but I could hardly make her out in the dense mist. Ignoring my calls to hurry along, she remained immobile, seemingly fascinated by something lying on the ground. I doubled back, curious to see what she had found.

There in front of her was a small brown ball of prickly spikes. She looked at me, looked back at the ball, looked at me, wagged her tail and emitted five barks in quick succession. ‘What the **** is that!?’

‘That’s a hedgehog, Audrey – he’s just woken up from his long winter’s sleep,’ I informed her.

‘Well, what the hell do I do with it?’ she asked, bewildered.

‘Let’s leave him alone, shall we.’ I said, ‘We don’t want to disturb him.’

Placing her wet nose close to his spikes, she tried to find out more about this odd creature by utilising her powerful olfactory senses. It moved slightly and she recalled in horror, leaping about three feet into the air as if one of her clumsy paws had triggered a landmine. I was laughing so much I feared I would lose consciousness and collapse on to the soggy grass, to be stumbled upon later by a surprised mid-morning dog-walker.

Audrey’s shock and awe reminded me of the first time I saw a jellyfish on the beach at Robin Hood’s Bay when I was an inquisitive 5 year-old boy on holiday with his grandparents. I was convinced I had discovered an alien and would not leave until I was satisfied I had killed the evil monster by repeatedly stabbing at it with a piece of driftwood dutifully handed to me by my smiling grandfather.

What innocence and wonder we experience when encountering bizarre animals for the very first time. It is also significant, is it not, that while I, a human boy, felt compelled to render my discovery lifeless, my little dog merely wanted to play with hers.

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Ducks Deluxe

by Enormous on October 9, 2007

‘Quick, catch one!’ Nelson screamed at me.

‘I can’t. They’re too fast,’ I told him, laughing.

I was dreaming that we were chasing three or four strange ducks around my mother’s house. It was a hilarious and comical situation and a lovely dream. I actually woke myself up at one point by laughing out loud, which is a wonderful experience that I would recommend to anyone.

The ducks that we were trying to grab hold of were very odd indeed. They were snowy white and had very long legs. They also had the yellowiest beaks I have ever seen and bright-blue eyes like those of a human baby. Nelson seemed to be an authority on the breed.

‘Why are they so bloody quick, Nel?’ I asked him.

‘It’s their pedigree,’ he replied, out of breath.

‘Eh?’

‘They’re called Princess Diana Ducks. They’re highly intelligent. They hold the land speed record over five miles – for a semi-domesticated flightless bird, that is.’

‘Ducks aren’t flightless’, I said, confused.

‘These are,’ he said ‘They’re Diana Ducks.’

We did not manage to catch one single Diana Duck and I have absolutely no idea why we were trying to do so.

‘Anyway, why do they call them that?’ I wanted to know.

‘Princess Di. She invented them,’ he told me. ‘We British invent a lot of things, don’t you know. Like hats and irony and the atom.’

‘And ducks,’ I said.

‘That’s right.’

Once again, I have not the faintest idea what Freudian meanings may be buried deep within my dream but I can tell you this: I haven’t laughed so much in ages – asleep or awake.

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The Beast of Blackwell

by Enormous on October 8, 2007

Blackwell is a pleasant village with a pretty Protestant church surrounded by fields around which Audrey and I often perambulate at midday. Recently, there have been several sightings by local residents and ramblers of a large, wild, black, cat-like creature that has apparently adopted the area as its home.

The appearance of similar reclusive animals has been reported in various other parts of the country over recent years but this is the first time such a thing has been spotted in Derbyshire – as far as I am aware.

A low-resolution photograph snapped by a local woman on her mobile telephone was printed in the local paper last week and purports to show the brute emerging surreptitiously from a gloomy copse. Her ten year-old daughter, who also witnessed the creature, referred to it as a ‘horrible monster’. However, because of the lack of scale or of any location implicit in the image, the animal that is depicts could simply be a harmless domestic moggy caught on camera as it was doing its daily rounds in someone’s back garden.

I must say that I am now slightly concerned for our safety: perhaps Audrey and I will venture towards Blackwell and its environs less often in future.

Of more significance is that fact that, on closer inspection, the blurry image could in fact be a photograph that has captured my hairy little dog as she was chasing a rabbit along one of the thorny lanes around Townend Farm, the like of which we can often by found wandering down.

I shall have to investigate this prospect further as I believe that, if it is indeed a likeness of my ‘horrible monster’ of a dog, we may be owed some royalties.

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Foxes

by Enormous on September 17, 2007

When Audrey and I were out in the frosty and deserted Derbyshire fields that border the village at 6:30am today enjoying a particularly early morning walk, we happened upon a family of foxes.

It was an amazing and inspiring thing to see. We sometimes see individual foxes when we are out and about around Townend Farm, but to encounter a whole family was unbelievable – not least because it is so late in the year.

There was what must have been the mother at the front of the pack (Is pack the proper collective noun for foxes? Or is it a bunch of foxes – or perhaps a school?) who was being dutifully followed by five or six clumsy little cubs. They crossed our path about 20 metres in front of us and they either had not seen us or simply did not feel threatened by our presence, because they were not in any hurry. They were nonchalantly going about their vulpine business as if we were not there.

They were looking for food, I suspect. The vixen was searching the ground intensely whilst her young seemed happy to just bump randomly into each other, tripping up frequently and occasionally falling over. We spent about two minutes watching them do this, and then off they went, down the hill and out of sight.

Even though Audrey was not on her lead, she was as transfixed as I was by her distant cousins, and, thankfully, remained rooted to the spot as we secretly observed the little group. After they had gone, however, and I mentioned the word ‘foxes’ to her, off she went, barely able to contain herself as she tried to follow their scent. I had to put her back on her lead at that point; to leave them and return home was the last thing that she wanted to do.

When she is barking in her sleep tonight, as she often does, I am fairly certain I know what she will be dreaming about.

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