Moon View

Traces and Tracks

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen Turner) — Sat, 16 Aug 2008 05:10:00 +0000

Observatory 7
Spitend Point, Elmley, TQ 986 666/ Moonrise 08.09

The estuary sparkled in the light of a full moon tonight, providing an auspicious ending to this brief salute to the night. Many creatures have escaped the camera eye. The bats, were too quick to capture and the owl was heard but not seen. The weasel refused to stay in one place. However, this was never an attempt to record an entire fauna but rather an opportunity to see what might happen by. The journey became an equivalence for that mixture of order and chance, that brings a world to life. Traces were glimpsed of creatures missed, but the truck tracks made on leaving are a reminder that people have the heaviest ‘footprints’. We should all tread lightly as we can.

Moth Attraction

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen Turner) — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 01:40:00 +0000

Observatory 7
Spitend Point, Elmley, TQ 986 666/ Moonrise 07.52

The near full moon at Spitend cast strong silvery shadows as I removed the fly sheet from the tent. One hypothesis suggests the navigation of moths is determined by transverse orientation relative to the position of the moon, and so I decided to use my inner tent as a giant alternative, in an effort to atract them toward this nearer beacon. Maybe I should call it ‘every moth I have ever slept with’.

Universe

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen Turner) — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 20:24:00 +0000

Observatory 7
Spitend Point, Elmley, TQ 986 666/ Moonrise 07.32

Tonight a tiny rock pool proved itself home to a colony of the smallest crabs. As the tide began to flood, rocks were lifted by tiny arms and stout shells, and the 20mm crabs appeared to feed in their micro universe. Shortly before the moon compelled the waters to fall, there was an urgent hunt for the rocky cover from which they had first emerged. A lug worm also came out of its hole to enjoy a brackish supper. Earlier, I had watched a black headed gull pull up around fifty for breakfast.

Rats

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen Turner) — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 22:05:00 +0000

Observatory 7
Spitend Point, Elmley, TQ 986 666/ Moonrise 07.04

A high wind took out the night vision camera early this morning, smashing it from its stand to the ground. Worse, the rains carried along with the storm, have soaked and disabled AC power to the laptop. I will have to summon spares and repairs from the project base.

Despite the huge annoyance, there is some small pleasure to remember and record, how easily the best laid plans of mice and men can go awry. Though no mice were seen on this wild night, a large brown rat did make an appearance shortly before the camera fell; scavenging amongst the flora and detritus close to the line of a recent high tide along the shore.

Thermometer

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen Turner) — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 16:16:00 +0000

Observatory 7
Spitend Point, Elmley, TQ 986 666/ Moonrise 06.27

Sitting for ages in a small patch of grass on the sea wall, to identify the maker of a persistant nocturnal sound. Patience was rewarded when this exotic looking character hove into view. Apparently, the rate by which the males rub their wings together, to generate their particular free wheeling sound, is determined by temperature. I consider the feasibility of a cricket thermometer.

Grasshopper

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen Turner) — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 22:02:00 +0000

Observatory 7
Spitend Point, Elmley, TQ 986 666/ Moonrise 05.39

Grasshoppers have been burring away in today’s warm if windy night, but are surprisingly hard to spot given their large numbers and the noise they make. Could they possibly be ventriloquists? This one however, strayed from its grassy cover and food, onto an attractive fabric near the camera.

Night Mare

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen Turner) — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 01:46:00 +0000

Observatory 7
Spitend Point, Elmley, TQ 986 666 / moonrise 04.39

A strong south westerly is driving white horses down the Swale to Windmill Creek, Dutchmans Island and the Flanders Mare that border remote Spit End Point.

They are not so much ’playing in the fishermans garden’ as trying to jump over the seawall where I am perched in the final observatory. Is a Flanders Mare also white? It's the derogatory name Henry VIII allegedly gave to poor Ann of Cleves (An eminently sensible woman I always thought, who kept her head whilst all around were losing theirs). With heavy rain starting to fall, tonight could be a night mare.

Hare

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen Turner) — Sat, 09 Aug 2008 10:54:00 +0000

Observatory 6
Wellmarsh Hide, Elmley/ TQ 939680/ Moonrise 15.22

One European myth alleges that the Hare was once a bird, transformed by Eostre, an Anglo-Saxon Goddess of Spring (from whom we derive the name for Easter) into the swift footed animal we know today. Lore has it however, that hares continued to lay eggs, giving rise to the idea of the egg bearing Easter 'bunny'. I'm told a hares form and lapwings nest are similar, and if eggs were observed in what were thought to be hare forms, this belief could have been given wing.

The Peckham Five

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen Turner) — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 10:33:00 +0000

Observatory 6
Wellmarsh Hide, Elmley / TQ 939680/ Moonrise 14.20

A fox strolled casually along the front of the hide beside the waters edge. Three lapwing were having none of it however, and he was forced into an undignified and faltering trot away from their 'birds only' sanctuary.

There are an over abundance of fox on the reserve with many 'urban rescues' being left to survive in the etablished territories of the wild population. I hear that five from Peckham were pitched out from the back of a van recently to make a new start on the Island. Unsuited to the wild life, they went to a nearby farmhouse and sat (as they were doubtless accustomed) waiting to be fed. Their bellies that night were filled with lead.

Ornithology

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen Turner) — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 03:07:00 +0000

Observatory 6
Wellmarsh Hide, Elmley / TQ 939680/ Moonrise 13.06

A dedicated birder left the hide earlier, overjoyed with a good showing of an American Golden Plover. Apparently only around six recorded visits to England in the last twenty five years have been recorded. Surrounded by young shellduck, lapwing, avocet, snipe and other more frequent flyers, I cannot help but feel more at home with their familiar mix of predawn performance and calls that make this marsh so special.

A little later I put the earpiece on my phone and play 'Ornithology' another American import by Charlie (Bird) Parker. His bebop melody was written over the chord progression for another song called, appropriately enough, ‘How High the Moon’.

Stake Out

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen Turner) — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 03:21:00 +0000

Observatory 5
Black Barn Mound TQ 771729/ Moonrise 11.52

Electric storms circle the observatory and shafts of silent lightning regularly illuminate this currently rain free site. It very humid though, and condensation is worryingly building on the tent, laptop, video server and on me. I have staked out a water vole hole hidden behind a bank of reeds, should one of my ratlike neighbours decide to brave the weather and come out to eat or to visit the latrine.

King Frog

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen Turner) — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 02:26:00 +0000

Observatory 5
Black Barn Mound TQ771729 / Moonrise 10.36

A gust of wind carries a concentrated spatter of rain to the tent. In a fraction of a second it speckles the water of the ditch I’m observing on screen. It's immediately a real, if shadowy window onto a six metre length of brackish ditch water with a metre high bank of reeds and grasses. The camera reveals scores of tiny Gobi fish, a large shrimp and the long shadowy form of an eel just below the surface. Marsh frogs however, dominate the night scene and link this underworld with mine.

Ghosts

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen Turner) — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 03:11:00 +0000

Observatory 4
Cliffe Rocks TQ 771714 / Moonrise 09.18

Grainy predawn images flicker inside the tent at twenty frames per second. Fluttery mesmerising moths have danced on camera for the past half hour, like tiny ghosts. By day they are almost impossible to see. The camouflage on this goat moth is a perfect match for the concrete rubble were it has come to rest.

Outcast

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen Turner) — Sun, 03 Aug 2008 22:15:00 +0000

Observatory 4

Cliffe Ruins/ TQ 771714/ Moonrise 07.58

At first I thought this 25mm mite was a sick watervole pushed from inside a nearby hole to die. On reflection, I think its a tiny shrew. Though waiting for over an hour, no living member of the vole colony appeared and so I quietly padded away with just this image of a death.

Dinner

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen Turner) — Sat, 02 Aug 2008 21:28:00 +0000

Observatory 4
Cliffe Ruins/ TQ771714/ Moonrise 06.33am

‘You used to get grass snakes over there by the sea wall, and there’s edible snails on that bank over there’ It’s about eight thirty in the evening and John, out walking his dog, helpfully shares his knowledge of the local wildlife. This one looks like a common garden snail, but is it edible? I could never tell an edible mushroom from a poisonous one either. One the other hand, I am sure there are many birds, toads and hedgehogs here that would find any sort of snail acceptable fare - whose food and indeed whose environment is it.

Lunar Rabbits

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen Turner) — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 21:54:00 +0000

Observatory 4
Cliffe Ruins TQ 771714/ moonrise 05.05 (new moon)

The Aztec moon god, was sometimes pictured as a rabbit, whilst Chinese, Japanese and Korean lore all feature a rabbit in the moon. Tonight’s new moon however, has been totally rabbit free. Ne’er a bushy tail nor quivering nose to be seen for miles.

These marshes are like a giant Swiss cheese, hollowed, tunnelled and undermined by the fervent digging of this wanton army. They have colonised so many a path and earth bank that it’s a wonder all the water in the lagoons has not drained away. Every twilight step is usually accompanied by a speedy blur as singletons and sometimes entire families, leg it at my approach.

Is their absence perhaps the result of some unknown effect of lunar gravity? With so many predators around, perhaps its simply a question of staying safe on the darkest night (When there’s no big rabbit in the sky to watch over them).

Friend

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen Turner) — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 10:50:00 +0000

Observatory 4
Cliffe Ruins TQ771714/ Moonrise 03.45

A colony of spiders inhabits the teazels beside the lagoon. My predatory friends are doing a good job of capturing the mosquitoes, if the large numbers of bodies stuck to their silky webs are any measure.

Cliffe Fever

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen Turner) — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 10:01:00 +0000

Observatory 3
Cliffe Creek TQ 715769/ Moonrise 02.11

The mossies are gathering and getting ready to strike. In the north Kent marshes you can be unlucky and get the attention of a female Anopheles plumbeus, a type that can transmit malaria if it first bites an infected person and then feasts on you. As the climate camp assembles just across the river at Kingsnorth, it’s a reminder that global warming is leading scientists to predict a resurgence of the disease here in the low lying salt marshes of north Kent, where in the nineteenth century is was common and known as the ague.

Here in Cliffe there was a mini outbreak in 1918, when soldiers were returned to their barracks after being diagnosed with worrying symptoms in Thessaloniki. The men had been treated in Greece by a British Army doctor called Ronald Ross, who had been awarded the Nobel Prize for Medicine for demonstrating the role of Mosquitoes in the spread of malaria. He had made explicit the need for them to avoid regions in England where the anopheles atroparvus mosquito thrived. During the next twelve months 500 civilians living close to the Hoo peninsula were diagnosed with malaria.

Neaped

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen Turner) — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 21:50:00 +0000

Observatory 3
Cliffe Creek/ TQ 715769/ moonrise 01.02

It is 22.43 and just about high tide; a low neap of about 5.3 metres. Neaps coincide with the moon in its 1st and 3rd quarter and so around four thirty this morning I should be able to see a moon fitting this description dipping toward the eastern horizon. A good spring tide will reach 6.8 metres on the Medway when the waters, pulled by the gravity of sun and moon together, seem to ‘leap upward‘. The neaps conversely, as the old medieval word might imply, appear nipped or stemmed in their flow. There are many mosquitoes about, intent of a good deal of neaping too.

Scrapes

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen Turner) — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 21:17:00 +0000

Observatory 3
Cliffe Creek TQ 715769/ Moonrise 00.11

In tented residence beside the seawall, in an area littered with small cinders and the many droppings of rabbits. Experimental scrapes evidence expanding colonisation of this immediate area. Every path and trail have burrows. I expect the rabbits will make an appearance sometime just ahead of sunrise to feed on the brambles, dock, thistles and sorrel that have also settled this unpromising ground.

Relative Scale

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen Turner) — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 10:25:00 +0000

Observatory 2
Gravesend/ TQ655 745/ Moonrise none

The earth is full of textures and layers. Leaves from different seasons are mulched down in an organic progression to decay, and a universe exists within its compound seams. Beneath the lime tree, the dead bumble bee, poisoned by rich sugars in the nectar, returns to the earth it came from. Ants scurry, earwigs wiggle and the worms, after a hot dry day, have dug themselves deep. Apparent emptiness teems with life.

At the very smallest of scales ‘every atom is a glowing sun’ and each photon a moon.

Cover your Ears

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen Turner) — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 10:59:00 +0000

Observatory 2

Gravesend/ TQ655 745/ Moonrise 23.37

When I was five, six earwigs began to rapidly crawl up my arm and disappeared into my T shirt causing huge panic. I knew from my mum that they were headed for my ears, where they would proceed to lay their eggs in my brain. Earwig is in fact derived from Old English, ēare "ear" and wicga, 'insect'. They do seem predisposed to warm, dark, moist places and so on adult reflection, the ear canal could quite possibly have been their intended goal.

There is one glossy looking character scuttling around beneath the lime trees tonight. What rock or bit of bark near here does his family cluster beneath. How far does his universe extend?

Another Early Bird

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen Turner) — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 03:22:00 +0000

Observatory 2
Gravesend/ TQ655 745 / Moonrise 22.55

Blackbirds jump suddenly into view on the monitor and start to peck and pull at the insects and berries. The fifteenth century inhabitants of the Milton Chantry where I sit observing, would have known these birds by the same name. Blackbirds have been the black birds since at least 1486. I wonder why this chap is honoured with the name and not the equally black rook, jackdaw, crow or raven - especially when Mrs B is more of a sooty brown? Of course, Mr B is not pure black. His bill and eye are that cadmium coloured yellow an artist might squeeze out from a tube. Is there such a thing as pure black? Even this night sky, is full of lights.

Early Birds

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen Turner) — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 04:00:00 +0000

Observatory 2

Gravesend / TQ655 745 / Moonrise 22.55 / 67.5%

It is not quite dawn, but a very few early birds are about. A pair of collared doves tentatively walk along the path, a female blackbird briefly rests on a branch and a furtive looking moorhen hops into a nearby pool to turn over the abundant weed in search of breakfast.

Patience

noreply@blogger.com (Stephen Turner) — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 02:40:00 +0000

Observatory 2 (Fort Gardens)
Gravesend / TQ655 745 / Moonrise 22.41 / 77.5%

Observatory 2 has two large lime trees in the immediate line of sight. Watching this location for the last three hours has been an exercise in patience. Nature has its own regularity and some events cannot be predicted or expected. The satisfaction is in a process of attentive watching. Light subtly changes in the moonlight, The fallen leaves get rustled by wind or by insects and the apparently still, is amazingly active, when a journey is slowed over time. Hurrying has no purpose.

In an apparent emptiness and in seeming inaction, there is much to be enjoyed and learnt when time is set aside; but I had hoped I might find another fox.