Category Archives: Ecology

Toppole in spring

April 23, 2018Belonging, Ecology, Everyday Mysteries, Time and SpaceAnn Game

Yesterday, it was only by chance that we went to Toppole, a small mediaeval hamlet in the hills above Anghiari. A friend who had been visiting family in Padova was here for just a few days, and, as she has never been to Anghiari before, I’d given some thought to the choice of a nearby walk to do. In a distracted state, however, I drove to Toppole instead of the place I’d planned on. In response to my ‘oh, wrong place’ as we turned the last bend, Marisa said ‘don’t worry, maybe it’ll be the right place.’

Continue reading Toppole in spring →

Sunday lunch

April 10, 2018Belonging, Ecology, Everyday Mysteries, Gift and GraceAnn Game

If church is big here on Sunday, so too is lunch with friends and family, at home, but, often also, out. Yesterday, which was a glorious sunny spring day, we went to Sunday lunch at Mafuccio agriristorante.

Continue reading Sunday lunch →

Weather, meetings, walking

March 26, 2018Belonging, Ecology, Everyday Mysteries, Gift and GraceAnn Game

It has turned bitterly cold, with light snow yesterday here in Anghiari, and snow on the mountains across the Tiber valley (Anghiari is located in the foothills of the Apennines, on a ridge between the Sovara and Tiber valleys). While I have been here before when it has snowed, there is something distinctive about the light in the landscape this time. It’s the spring light, I realize, that is giving a particular brightness to what would normally be a wintery view. If you look again at this photo which was at the beginning of my last blog and imagine snow on the mountains, you might get some idea of this view.

Continue reading Weather, meetings, walking →

Sun, and fire

January 11, 2017Belonging, Ecology, Everyday Mysteries, Gift and Grace, UncategorizedAnn Game

Yesterday, after days of very bleak weather, there was sun. Everyone I ran into, in shops, in the piazza, in the bar, said, ‘oggi c’è il sole!’ People were out and about, even if not pausing for long in the piazza, as the temperature was still well below zero. It was very likely to be the last day of sun before I left Anghiari, so I decided to go for a walk. (The weather has precluded the possibility of walking for some days now.) Continue reading Sun, and fire →

A walk in the Sovara valley

December 22, 2016Ecology, Everyday Mysteries, Time and Space, UncategorizedAnn Game

My Italian blogs tend to focus on meetings with other people. This makes sense given the wonder of communicating in another language. But, in fact, my daily routines here typically involve walking in these hills, the foothills of the Apennines. And so here is a blog on my first walk on this visit. Continue reading A walk in the Sovara valley →

unremembered love

July 12, 2016Belonging, Bondi Beach, Care, Ecology, Gift and Grace, Time and SpaceDemelza Marlin

We belong to the world and are of the world because our formative experience was one of relation and involvement – with the maternal body, and through it, with the world. It is from that primary relation that we derive our ability to love, to feel loved and to be with. But we don’t remember it. We don’t remember the oneness of the womb or our infantile intertwinning with our mother’s bodies because memories belong to subjects and this foundational love was laid down before we became identifiable subjects [bounded subjects before an objective world].

Memory is about parts, separated and put back together. Member, dismember, remember. It is the job of the subject to undertake that ‘recollection’ of discrete events and experiences and forge them into a coherent narrative. But the primary experience I am describing happens to a self that doesn’t have parts, in a world that is without separations. Continue reading unremembered love →

Spiders of Newtown

July 6, 2016Ecology, Human and Animal, UncategorizedAndrew Metcalfe

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If you type ‘Australia’ and ‘spider’ into Google, the first pages of results are dominated by accounts of danger. Australia has 2400 species of spider, but pest control companies and tourist guides only want to talk about ‘the ten most dangerous Australian spiders’. They show mugshots and profiles and advise people what to do if they’re bitten. Since I’ve been in Newtown, however, I have seen no spider more dangerous than a huntsman.

This arachnophobic culture has supported the spread of the factoid that, no matter where you are, you are never more than 3 feet from a spider. While this claim is too simplistic, it is truer than you might imagine. Spiders are among the most common terrestrial animal, found in all environments. In a review of spider ecology, AL Turnbull reported spider population densities as high as 842 spiders per square metre, for an English meadow. The average density in the 22 studies he reviewed was 130.8 spiders per square metre.

I do not know the density in my Newtown garden, but on any day I will see many spiders, and over a couple of weeks I will see many types of spider. I’ve seen leaf-curling spiders, long jawed spiders, tent spiders, jumping spiders, garden orbweavers, golden orbweavers, and many that I cannot identify. Some have bodies that are two centimetres across, some are so small I have trouble photographing them, and there must be many that I have not seen because of their size or inaccessible habitat.

Continue reading Spiders of Newtown →

Striped Marsh Frogs

June 10, 2016Ecology, Human and Animal, UncategorizedAndrew Metcalfe

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In our area of Newtown, the basic house block is only about 5 metres across. Neighbouring yards are separated by high wooden fences, and the gardens, traditionally, have been small and rough. The local council warns against growing vegetables because of concern about lead and arsenic in the soil. And there is a large dog and cat population.

This might not seem a promising environment for frogs, but even before we put in our first fish pond, sixteen years ago, we had striped marsh frogs passing through our garden, sometimes even coming indoors. I don’t know where they came from or where they were going, but, since we built the ponds, many seem to have stayed.

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This is not a grasshopper

June 8, 2016Creativity, Ecology, Everyday Mysteries, Gift and Grace, Human and Animal, Martin Buber, UncategorizedAndrew Metcalfe

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the force

of what lives us

outliving the mountain.

John Berger

Last week I was delighted to come across this animal.

Part of my pleasure was that I thought I could identify it. Even though it was now in the front herb garden, and no longer among the camellias at the back, I presumed it was the same fine grasshopper with which I began this series of blog posts.

I don’t think this recognition was at the heart of my response though. The best clue to this are the words I said to myself at the time. If my response had been recognition of the same individual, I would have thought ‘Oh, it’s that same grasshopper‘. But this wasn’t my response. The delighted thought that came to me was ‘Oh, it’s you‘. Why did I say You? What did I see that made this a You and not just ‘that same grasshopper’?

This isn’t a minor grammatical quibble. There is a world — an ecology — of difference between the two utterances. Continue reading This is not a grasshopper →

Camouflage

June 7, 2016Ecology, Human and Animal, UncategorizedAndrew Metcalfe

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Looking at this caterpillar, in a basil plant, it is tempting to ascribe it intentions that it does not have. Certainly it has brilliant camouflage, not only in its colour but in its twig-like behaviour, but is it intending to deceive a predator? Is it deliberately hiding in greenery; has it decided to act like a twig? Continue reading Camouflage →