Nature's Place

Except for the rain it is very quiet at home today. The roar of the water hitting the roof overwhelms every other sound. Probably because the roof is of a thin coated metal, like corrugated iron. The sight of the rain falling on the already soaked earth. A pleasant cacophony of sound and vision, to me.

I’ve been sorting my pictures, just deleting what is no good. One of the good things about digital camera’s is I can take as many shots of a subject as I like or can get. Since they upload to the computer I don’t have to pay for expensive film to see them. That’s a great advantage over how it used to be. I once had a good camera but I didn’t use it because it was so expensive to see what I captured on film.

The downside is there are now a heap of pictures to view and keep and file, or delete. It’s always the way isn’t it, where there’s an up there’s a down. And we manage. I’ve just downloaded Picassa and it looks very good but only time will tell. So far I have found the old Windows picture viewer best for deleting as I go. Some programs are just not well enough thought out, you’d think the people who design them don’t actually use them.

The water has settled on the lawn outside the window and I can see the drops that fall from the trees hitting the surface. The rain is still falling as well, only more lightly now. It’s lovely to see the gentle disturbances by the rain of the pools, on the surface of my mind. Calming and relaxing of any tension.

Relaxation is the key to enjoyment, without it any pleasure will bring a corresponding displeasure. An excitation of the psyche reverberates in the mind and returns like the ripples on the pool of water. Relaxation filters the harsh edges of the rippling until there is only a simple pleasure in being, no problem.

It’s the way the cats are most of the time, if they haven’t been mistreated by man. Just lazing about, as cats do, enjoying the simplicity of being. Or being the simplicity of cat.

We can learn a lot by observing the nature and creatures around us. They remind me of places inside I may have forgotten for a while, aspects of me, my own real nature.

T’is enlightening to see.

All copyright reserved / Mark Berkery

I have company today. As I sit here typing this in I am visited by a small spider about half a centimeter long. It is a vitally alive creature, vigorous in its manner.

If I approach it with a finger it stops suddenly still, alert. And if I blow on it gently it digs in and grips the plastic table top with an appearance of grim determination. When I get close enough to be an immediate danger to it the little fellow jumps about four or five centimeters away from me. If I blow him away into the forest of things on the table he just comes back, to go where no spider has gone before perhaps.

He moves swiftly across the terrain of my work table as if he knows exactly where he’s going. Maybe he does, maybe he knows the table top well. But I haven’t seen him around here before.

He’s searching for food and I reckon with all the bites I’ve been getting lately sitting at the computer at night there should be plenty around. He only has to find it.

Good luck to him. I could do with a few more spiders actively seeking out the little biters.

Today I signed up for a blog with WordPress.com. I have been coming to this for some time but the way I am is to know the field. I have to satisfy myself it is the right course of action. The only way for me to do that is to find out all about the business of blogging, the various means of realising a blog, and the various options within those means. In other words I found out exactly what is available and exactly what I want. And it is a job doing so.

Today I came to the point where I had enough of the looking. There was no more reservation as to what platform to use, or the means by which I would have it online. Now I know what I can do with it and expect from it, more or less. It is really very simple once the homework is done. The homework is the difficult part, it always was.

I am pleased. Really pleased. All the work has borne fruit in that I am completely at ease with what I have done. No more reservation is no more stress. There is always some tension involved when doing something new.

There is the lovely smell of fresh cut grass in the air tonight. Yes, I mowed the lawn again. If you can call it a lawn, it’s about an acre of grass. And I use a push mower. It’s another kind of job. The rain has been regular, almost every day for nearly six weeks. Not always a lot of rain, but regular. It’s been sunny more often than not the last few days.

The conditions are perfect for growing grass, the grass you mow. It will be some time before the rain stops and the grass stops growing, late Autumn, early Winter maybe. In Australia, where I am, the seasons are reversed to the northern hemisphere.

Things are almost back to normal with the mozzies, at least around the house during the day. I can go for short walks at night too without being eaten. It’s the midges turn now. Ha! Little black biters. I just have to plan around the not so pleasant nature here. And it’s Cane Toad season again, no problem, must have frozen twenty in the last few days.

I went for a walk down by the beach this afternoon. Along a track about a hundred metres inland and running parallel to the beach, behind the dunes. A little way in from the road I saw a few unusual birds in the trees and flying about, there was a lovely darkness about them, an elegant mischief. They didn’t stay still long enough for me to photograph them but I got something else that is probably quite rare.

Have you ever noticed how a bird will dump any excess weight before taking flight? It’s almost universal in my experience a bird will shit just before or after takeoff. I’ve seen every kind of bird do it. Today was no exception, the exception was that I caught it on camera. That pellet you can see falling beneath the bird could not be anything else. It was perched on the highest point around, nothing above it. Just after this shot was taken she took to the air and was gone. That’s the way to start any journey, dump the excess baggage.

The birds around here are too fast for me to keep up with, they eat out all the time and don’t let people close at all. There is an abundance of food for them around here after the rains. Maybe I’ll put up a feeder for the winter, and some water, maybe some birds will come my way then. I’ll see.

A bit further on I came to a clearing in the bush and trees between me and the beach. There was only very low ground cover and one dead tree reaching bony fingers to the sky about forty metres away. On these bare branches there were two eagles perched close together.

I stopped dead in my tracks but I was too late, one of them had seen me and was already lifting off the branch. The other one looked around to see what had caused the first to take flight. He didn’t see me at first, maybe because I didn’t move. But then he must have recognised the silhouette and immediately followed the first into the air.

I hadn’t even turned the camera on yet. I let it go and walked on for a while until I came to a track running left down to the beach. It was nice to walk in the cool water with the waves washing in right up to the dunes. There was a fisherman on the beach a long way ahead and I saw one of the eagles along the line of vegetation, never venturing far from the cover of the bush.

Every now and then I would see it in the distance swooping out to the waters edge to pick up something, food no doubt. And then fly back in to cover. I’ve seen the eagles around here catching fairly big fish from the rivers, but I don’t know if they will dive into the sea, but why not? As I approached him, eyeing him up for a shot (of the camera), he took to the air and came to rest further on down the beach.

So next time I approached him I avoided looking at him directly, I looked out to sea while seeing him with my peripheral vision. That worked, I got close enough to snap him as he stood at the edge of the sand, apparently unconcerned this time. I think looking too intently and directly probably made him uneasy. I just managed to get him in the frame as he took off again, a bit of a blur but the outline is dramatic.

When I got home I started going through what I can and can’t do with the blog. It’s going to take me some time to get to know this amazing publishing tool.

Isn’t it incredible it is possible to publish to a worldwide audience of millions on the net, and for free! All that is necessary is to have something of real value to offer. And someone to read it.

Truly amazing.

All copyright reserved / Mark Berkery

I noticed it a few days ago but I didn’t mention it, maybe because I didn’t really believe it. There are a few spots along the coast near where I live where I frequently go. One of them I enjoy because there is a fair walk from the road where I have to park the car, and the walk is through coastal bushland where wallaby’s and birds and goanna live. Even though there are many farms around here and it is often used by people passing through it is still wild in many ways.

Today I took a pic of another kind of wildness I didn’t expect to find here. Just a few metres in from the road, in plain view of anyone walking this way, was a small bush with women’s bra’s draped over it like tinsel on a Christmas tree. That’s what it was, some sex obsessed man’s present to himself that no doubt served to quell some emotional demand in him. The demand for sexual gratification.

All men have it, this demand, it’s what drives the reproduction of the species. And there’s nothing wrong with that, it’s what all animal bodies do. But man, through thinking about his sexuality, has emotionalised and complicated the matter out of all proportion.

The fact is all bodies mate in some way or other. Sex is sex and serves the species. But man has realised the need for love but he doesn’t know how to find it, so he gets confused about sex.

Poor man.

I went on in towards the beach and saw some shrubbery a little past the narrow trail to the sand and I thought I’d investigate. There were a few different kinds of grasshopper amongst the foliage and a few different insects. I took a load of photo’s and got a few good shots, I always try a few different settings and modes to learn what works, where and when. A delicate hopper, a two faced spider, and a tiger bug.

I went on in to the beach and it was lovely. There was nobody there for miles in both directions and the waves were crashing with that incessant roar that is always here by the ocean. I walked a while along the edge of the water, sometimes getting my feet and legs wet. Nice, cool water. Along the length of the beach I could see flotsam, loads of driftwood and some rubbish from some far away place.

The driftwood was as big as trees at times, some so big they had sunk into the sand and only the main trunk and some branches sticking up here and there. I wonder where all the driftwood came from, somewhere up or down the coast maybe? or some far off land where there had been a mighty storm. I don’t know, I couldn’t tell the kind of wood. We have had coconuts along here so it’s not unthinkable the trees came from another land. It could even be from that tsunami so many months ago.

The clouds were multiform and lovely and soft in a blue sky. And the white of the foam on the breaking waves was easy on the eye.

When I turned around I came back by the softer sand. I often do this for the exercise. To walk in the soft sand is demanding of a full range of movement of the legs and hips that helps strengthen and mobilise the hips and lower spine. The muscles from the calf to the tip of the toes are all vigorously engaged. It’s good for the body basically.

I am relatively new to photography, I’m sure I have mentioned it before. There were a few puddles of water on the trail where it collects after the rain. The birds know about these puddles and like to bathe in them when nobody is around. I’ve seen them before. I waited about five metres away for one to go to the water but as soon as I stopped so did they. It’s like that around here, the creatures are very shy.

But I waited anyway and it paid off. Splash, one bird dipped in for a quick bath but was gone before I even saw it clearly. Then another. So I stood there with the camera pointed at the spot I thought would be best and set the pre-focus so all I had to do was complete the press of the shutter button.

I was looking at the lcd screen on the back of the camera for the bird to drop into the water and as soon as It did I pressed the button. And splash is all I got, it was just too quick for me. I took another one and splash is all I got again. It was getting dark and the mozzies were coming out so I went home.

This amazing beast, monster moth, was at the doorway when I got back.

All copyright reserved / Mark Berkery

Even with the air conditioning on the car is hot here in Australia‘s summer. Especially after going for a walk in the bush. The power windows stopped working last week and I couldn’t find the fault myself. It is inconvenient and I do prefer to drive with the windows down. But I just have to accept what can’t be changed, for now.

Today the mechanics I have met since moving to N. E. NSW looked at it for me. It could have cost a lot but I can’t live without working windows in the car. Peter, one of the partners, spent ten minutes on it and it was working again. Mark, the origional owner of the business only charged me ten dollars. Isn’t that amazing? That’s a rhetorical question. It is amazing.

Mechanics are notorious for taking advantage of the lack of mechanical know – how of the man on the street but these guys are the best. Good old fashioned service without the rush, and pleasantly communicative. And honest, they do what needs to be done and you pay an honest rate for it.

If you are ever in this neck of the woods and need a mechanic you will find them just outside the village of Burringbar, north of Byron on the old Highway One to Murwillumbah. Murnane is the name and you’ll find them in the phone book, or if you’re in the area just ask someone.

It’s good to be treated right and I thought I’d pass it on. I have met other gentleman mechanics but not since I started writing this blog and this blog is about my experience here and now.

After I left Murnane’s, with my windows working, I went to the Mooball N. P. for a walk. More like a climb really, it’s very steep hill country. But it is relatively unknown and there’s a certain freedom in being alone in a place few people go to. I enjoy it.

I drove around a bend and saw a Goanna run for the trees in the distance, about a hundred metres. You have to keep an eye out for the creatures if you want to see them in the wild. I saw where it went and made a mental note and stopped about where it ran from the road. I got out of the car and there it was, a small Goanna, about two and a half foot long from nose to tail tip.

I got the camera out and got a couple snaps of this shy creature as it peered from around the trunk of the tree it was climbing to escape from me. A slender quiet thing flicking its tongue to see what I taste like. It may know me a little if ever we meet again, and maybe won’t run away so quickly. It didn’t run too far until I moved around the tree for a better shot. It might have felt I was trying to flank it. And I was but only to take its picture, but it didn’t know that. ( P1000611(1).jpg )

I went for a walk then and came across a few small creatures. A few spiders in their webs and a few grasshoppers. Magnificent creatures in themselves the way they are structured for what they do. And they are designed to survive. The magnificent webs of silver and golden thread that house and feed the spider. And the powerful legs and secondary wings that enable the grasshopper to get away, some of them have suits of thorn so if any frog got one in its mouth it would soon spit it out.

It was nice and quiet on the trails in this place. Nothing to name or think about except nature. But most of the time just seeing what is there, the leaves of a myriad different plants and fallen things. And smelling the air, and feeling the cool breeze up in the hills. That’s nice.

On the way home I stopped at an old spot of mine on the top of a hill that was probably the site of a house before it became a national park. I have stopped here many times and got a few good pix but today was special.

I was in a hollow looking where some old palm trees had been dumped a long time ago. It’s an area that I visit since I found some beautiful yellow fungus there before I had the new camera. The old one couldn’t focus on it. I have also seen a big hornet scouting the place at another time, moving slowly and deliberately from place to place looking for I don’t know what. Food, shelter, nest site. The same things people look for I reckon.

Today I met Golden Boy and he posed for me for a long time, and I thanked him for that. It is a privilege to get close to the wild creatures and I was grateful for it. This fellow was magnificent, a streamlined body with four wings and the muscle to control them that gave him exquisite control in flight. An efficient hunting machine that told its predators ‘I don’t taste good’ with its yellow and black colouring. ( P1000660.jpg + P1000624.jpg)

He had such control in flight he could take his prey on the wing. I saw him take a small insect from the air with ease, as if harvesting what is naturally and rightfully his. He is a predator after all. Cruising his territory with an air of invincibility. Poised to respond to the slightest significant signal.

Such beauty of form and function was unsurpassed in my view today. You should see that head swivel on its ‘neck’ and focus and lock when something I can’t see attracts his attention. It’s robotic. Simply a beautiful, deliberate, instinctively intelligent hunting machine.

Sylvan of this hollow in the top of a mountain. A privilege to meet.

Today was an adventure. I went where nobody goes. Into the swamp called Billinudgel NR. There wasn’t a single sign anybody has been this way since the rain started. It seems so long ago. Even then hardly anyone goes there.

I am honoured. To go where nobody goes.

I saw sign of wallaby, cow and snake. They were the only tracks in the sandy trails that I could discern. There were other creatures too, the spiders and dragonfly’s and many unseen things moving in the water. Too deep to pass in places.

Oh, and a few bees. And of course the mozzies.

I have been waiting for the opportunity to go back to see what became of the spider and the wasp that made their homes on the tall reedy grass, and today it happened.

I didn’t plan to go, I just went on the way back from somewhere else. I could because I had my new gum boots in the back of the car. I am pleased they have been useful at least once.

It was overcast today with the occasional ray of sunshine and the trails were still under yellow brown water, but not as bad as a week ago. The rain has been easing lately and many creatures are venturing out again.

The early trails were easy to navigate, the water was not very deep to start with. The ones deeper in were another matter. I was in water up to within two inches of the rim of my new gum boots in places.

But it was ok, I used my walking stick to test the depth before I would put my foot down and I got through. Slowly but surely.

I got through to the place where I first saw the spider and the wasp living on the reeds over two weeks ago. See Wily Little Spider and Little Lady Wasp (no Pictures uploaded yet). It was under a foot of water in places but seemed well protected from the worst of the storms we’ve been having.

I went to where I thought the wasp nest was and found one.

It is in the same general area, within a metre or two, but this one has three wasps on it and it looks like it has been built up, if it’s the same one.

There are more chambers to one side of what could be the old nest; it has the same general size and shape if you take away the new chambers.

Maybe they are not complete nomads, maybe the first nest, if it survives, is used by new arrivals looking for a safe place for their young.

How safer than one that has survived the storms? Anyway, it was good to see them.

You wouldn’t think it possible but I found the spider’s nest too. Only there was no spider in it. It took a while though because things had definitely changed here.

You can see it’s the same one. I rotated this pic so it has the same orientation as the first pic I took of it over two weeks ago.

It was hanging over and upside down because some insect had eaten away one side of the reed causing it to weaken and fall over. The structure no longer able to support the weight of the seed cluster above.

I suspect the spider evacuated when the house fell down and probably lives nearby in another cosy web. Or it is long dead, who knows?

On the way back I checked for Big Orb and there she was, still sitting in her web oblivious to the passage of time. Just being spidergirl.

What a beauty. It’s been two weeks since I’ve seen her and she hasn’t changed a bit.

All copyright reserved / Mark Berkery

Today is the last day of my life so far. It could be the last day altogether. Then what? Nothing? I don’t know. It doesn’t really matter. I don’t mind not knowing. I’ll find out soon enough.

Surrounded by mozzies, they are at the windows and the doors. They are anywhere it is cool and damp, that way they live a little longer to do what they have to do and make more mozzies.

But if it’s the last day there will be no more mozzies. If there are more mozzies it’s not the last day.

There are plenty of mozzies to make more.

Maybe it’s not the last day at all.

Maybe it’s just today.

What’s the Rosella got to do with it?

Everything!

All copyright reserved / Mark Berkery

Today is a good day. The flip response is ‘every day is a good day’. But that’s not true. There is only today. And today is a good day.

Today I was out the back yard looking at the nature. You know, the simple things. The water in the bowl and other containers, getting rid of mozzie breeding grounds.

The leaf on the small tree with a neon fly on it. Or the tomato plant growing by the young Jacaranda tree to see if anything is ripe yet. The simple things. No big deal.

I saw a small yellow butterfly fluttering around the garden and as much as I love to see them up close I wasn’t going to chase it for a shot. That is too trying, too wanting, too much of a strain.

I smiled and let it go about its business of visiting the plants it was attracted to, maybe depositing eggs, or just sitting there being at ease in existence for a moment, nothing doing.

I was down on my hunkers looking at some flowers as the butterfly wandered around seeming to tempt me this way, no this way, no no that way. No way!

Then she came and sat beside me, just a couple of feet away. So I got the camera ready, slowly, gently. And she sat there posing for me. Proud little thing.

She didn’t go away for ages then and I wasn’t going to disturb her, and my legs were beginning to hurt from the cramped position. Well, you can’t have everything.

Two more came and settled in different places, the one occasionally chasing the other. The other fluttering its wings in disapproval. Delightful to see.

I was able to get a pair of gum boots yesterday, the last pair they had in Tweed? All the shops had sold out over the deluge, which isn’t over yet.

I wanted a pair to go into the reserve to see if the wasp and the spider are still on the long reedy grass. Maybe I’ll do that tomorrow.

Today I went in from another entrance, Jones road. The boots are a good fit but they are a lot heavier for walking far, and not as comfortable as my walkers. I was able to go through the pooled water but the mozzies are a serious deterrent, there are loads of them now and I suspect they will be around for a while to come.

The trouble is the diseases they can give me, all sorts of fevers it seems, so I can’t forget the repellent even once.

If nature is a representation in sense of mans true nature then mossies are those niggling thoughts, worries and fears. The mental and emotional itches that just won’t go away.

The way to deal with them is put on the mozzie repellent, learn to meditate, sit. And swat them with right action and they fall like, well, mozzies.

I didn’t go far today, it was really too tiring with the new gum boots, and dodging mozzies is hard work.

On the way out I saw these two flyers attached to each other by their tail ends. They were definitely connected because when one wanted to fly away and the other didn’t they didn’t go far.

It must be difficult going the same way when facing opposite directions. The stronger one usually wins.

People do that, get attached and try to go their own ways while staying together. Though they are not connected physically the way these two were, not often anyway.

It doesn’t work for long, or they just get used to the pain.

All copyright reserved / Mark Berkery

It never ceases to amaze me the natural intelligence behind the building of nature’s structures.

As it is the basic instinct of all creatures to reproduce it is not surprising it is in the housing of the young where the most obvious intelligence is employed. Have a look at the first picture.

There are a number of features to this structure that make it ingenious. The first is its innocuous appearance, it could be any bundle of natural debris thrown together higgledy piggledy. But it’s not, it’s a very deliberate and intelligent design.

There are at least two bundles of strands holding it to the blade of grass. If one is detached the other is probably strong enough to hold it. A backup system. I’d bet if the second bundle was cut more than half way through it would still hold.

Nearly all the pieces that make it up are pointing out and down from the top so rain will just run off and the larva or pupae inside stays dry.

It is probably made up of the pieces taken from the blade it is hanging from, see how the blade ends on the right just past the point it hangs from? How’s that for economy of effort.

This also has the effect of denying any predators access from the right. And if one landed right on the end it would probably fall off as the blade bends over at the narrow point on the other side of the nest

See how the blade is chewed narrow to the left of the nest. This will also deter any predator big enough to demolish the nest from crossing to the nest from the left.

Have you ever noticed when a large beetle or ant comes to a narrowing of the path it often turns back? And if a large enough insect crossed to the nest its weight might be enough to bend the blade at its narrow point and it would likely fall off.

I don’t think the creature that made this sat down and thought about it. I think it arises within the creature as an intelligent response to a need of that form of life to survive with its particular characteristics in the situation – if it was a desert it might use sand and hang it from a stone, or attach it to a tumble weed and send it on its way, who knows.

And because the response fits this creature so well it can be called its instinctive nature. Its intelligent instinctive nature.

Have a look around you. There is a hundred examples of nature’s ingenuity at arms length unless you live in a box. And even then nature can’t be kept out.

The second picture is of some creatures nest built using available materials to reinforce and disguise. It’s the simplicity of the thing that deceives the thinker into overlooking the obvious intelligence.

Or the White Ant’s skyscraper. A magnificent idea with a fatal flaw. Can you see it? I didn’t say nature makes no mistakes.

Or look at the Jumping Ant’s nest. No uninvited guests here. No predator to the ant is going to cross that carpet of needles very quickly. Predators like mice and rats and other such creatures.

This is the Billinudgel Nature Reserve after all, not Africa.

All copyright reserved / Mark Berkery