A moth struggles with mortality

Red-necked Footman Atolmis rubricollis.

Popped downstairs to make a cup of tea.  Heard a teeny-tiny tapping, a teeny-tiny tapping of a Red-necked Footman's foot at the kitchen door.  On opening said door, he begged, in a teeny-tiny voice, begged to be photographed, begged to have his teeny-tiny likeness recorded for posterity.

"Why?" I asked, "Why do you want your teeny-tiny likeness recorded for posterity?" 

He recovered himself a little, stroked an antenna and, in that enigmatic manner for which footmen are famed, quoted Boltanski by way of reply:

"We are all so complicated and then we die.  We are a subject one day, with our vanities, our loves, our worries, and then one day, abruptly, we become nothing but an object, an absolutely disgusting pile of shit.  We pass very quickly from one stage to the next, it's very bizarre.  It will happen to all of us, and fairly soon too."

"But what if,..." I proffered, paraphrasing the aforementioned Frenchman so as not to appear the less well-read in this exchange between man and moth, "... what if I take your photograph, and then you die, and then, at some point in the dim and distant future, no one on earth recognizes you in the photograph?  You will have died twice."

"I'll take the risk, you take the photo,..." quipped the invertebrate, "... and make sure you get my good side."

Valentia semi-uplandia

Common and approachable things that have been close to me whilst I have had my phone in my hand over the last week or so,…

 Cloudberry Rubus chamaemorus growing through a ‘reindeer lichen’ Cladonia sp.

Cloudberry growing through Heather Culluna vulgaris.

Cloudberry growing through moss Sphagnum sp. They do like to grow through stuff.

 Northern Eggar Lasiocampa quercus f. callunae larva.

 

 Garden Tiger Arctia caja larva or ‘woolly bear’.

Two-banded Longhorn Beetle Rhagium bifasciatum, couldn’t fly straight for all the tea in a place where there is a lot of tea, e.g. China,… or a Sainsbury’s distribution centre.

Large Pine Weevil Hylobius abietis, one of the worst/best (depending on human/weevil point of view) pests of commercially important coniferous trees in Europe.

Wood-sorrel Oxalis acetosella a mainstay of the depauperate ground flora usually found in alien forestry.

Sand Spurrey Spergularia rubra on a forestry track.

Saw a bird!

Saw the Greater Yellowlegs at Posbrook Floods today,... which was nice.  

Twilight of the,... err,... everything really

The Borders in the gloaming; the gloaming in the Borders.

In reiver country for much of the last week.  The ranks of alien conifers and denuded hillsides beyond are all but devoid of Black Grouse; atop the ridge the peaty-puddled heathery plateau is free of Hen Harrier; and the carbon dioxide in the sky above is tipping the balance at 400 ppm.

Take a bow everybody,... take a bow.