I spend a lot of time worrying about the decline of species. Every year I anxiously wait for the gang gangs to descend cautiously upon our bird baths with their croak-door caw and red crests. I love them so. I melt when the yellow tailed cockatoos land under the hakea and pick up it's seeds to break in their beaks.
This year there are ladybugs - hundreds of them. The town wonders if they're the good or the bad ones. Everything seems like a sign of something worse. A bushcrafter I follow on socials points to his clean windscreen and wonders where the bugs have gone. Twenty years ago, their green yellow innards would be smeared all over the glass.
One by one creatures are added to threatened species lists. There is less road kill not because we're cautious, but because there are more roads and less animals to kill. If one doesn't ignore it, one goes mad. One can only focus on the living things.
Like this long necked eastern turtle that cautiously ambled across our acreage. They are a species of snake necked turtles that live in and around water bodies, bending it's head sideways into it's shell instead of pulling it directly back. He does so as I approach. I don't mean to scare him and should leave him alone - I know this, but I feel charmed by him too, and can't resist a closer peak.
Moss covered, seed splattered from the cut grass, he walks as fast as he can, which compared to the rabbits, is not fast at all. We don't know where he's going. Perhaps he's lost, we wonder. Do we call the wildlife people?
I argue against it. We have five acres and are next to a reserve - it's hardly a roadside. In the winter, they get hit by cars, as they are so easily camouflaged against the tarmac. You aren't meant to pick them up, but sometimes you can't stop traffic, and you put aside should to rush them across the road lest they are hit. Their shells are hard, but they are no match for the automobile.
They are hardly, too, handling the cold - some are even found ovewintering in ice. I don't smell it, but apparently they can emit quite the scent when threatened. I'm not close enough, perhaps, for it to stink bomb me.
I suggest we let him be. At the bottom of the property is a dam - he'll find his way down there soon enough. Slowly, but soon enough. We have seen them nesting down there once before, so they are around. All evening I think of him ambling, slowly slowly, down past the big gums, through the cavorting rabbits, under the watch of magpies and blue wrens that shout at this be-shelled stranger in their garden.
I don't know how old he or she is, but these creatures can live for thirty to fifty years. I wonder what it knows about the decline of insects and birds and fish. I hope they has enough to eat in the dam at the bottom of the property, and that their babies survive this season.
Go well, turtle. Live long. May you find enough to eat and may your children have children and their children have children, and may all the beasts around you survive and prosper.
With Love,
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sadly a lot of wildlife perishes daily everywhere
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Thanks. 800 words is a bit high though for social media. People have to have time to read it and writing 800 is beyond a lot of people. Your community I guess but.. meh.
Also 150 words is not enough, and they are still publishing 5, 4, 6 posts per day in many communities collecting little by little, we are avoiding 4 photos, 100 words and receiving something! Since they earn with that "system" they will have to make an effort and write at least to justify the effort, you are not seeing that side! (clearly if we see a post with less text but great content there will always be an exception) only that those posts have not arrived yet (in general). If you go back to the old AN, there are still people who want to farm. They created a "legal" and an illegal farming system. Since it wasn't supervised, vices were created that unfortunately we have to fix! Possibly the rule will change in the future when users with good quality posts start participating.
Oh don't worry I see that side as admin for Hive Gardeners and having been on Hive for a long time, I know what goes on, believe me. I mute, block etc. I still think 800 is too long, 600 words is probably more appropriate. I do like what you say that 'clearly if we see a post with less text but great content there will always be an exception' makes me feel you're more reasonable!
Lovely ode to the turtle. We have a swamp to our north and a small pond 2 farms down. We see turtles crossing the property between them periodically.
#hive #posh
I love turtles, they fascinate me, both land and water/sea ones. How they move, both on land and in water. I have never seen one with a moss top, how cool is that. I think you made the right decision, only he knows where he is going. So best to let him be, if there is no danger around xxx
I've since found out they lay eggs away from the water, and that's algae they use for camouflage! So yes I was right.
I love how it's hiding the neck :)
We have some snails that my son plays with. I don't know why but kids go crazy seeing random garden invaders.
I think kids have a a natural connection to animals we tend to forget!
Sure they have. :)