Steve's Nature Quiz #18

Kibbling? What on earth is that?

a) The brother or sister of a goat.

b) Separating the seeds from a carob pod.

c) The act of kissing and nibbling as practised in the courting rituals of many animal species (including us).


Much as I would like it to be either a) or c) the answer is the rather more mundane b). It's carob picking season here in Crete and when the harvest has been gathered in there will be an awful lot of kibbling going on around the villages. Why not tag along with us as we tour the upland villages of east Crete amid the autumn flowers and wonderful wildlife in Series 6 of the #CreteNature blog?
Location: Schinokapsala 720 55, Greece

Comments

  1. Simon Douglas Thompson1 October 2017 at 13:52

    I will do with pleasure, this blog makes me want to visit the Greek islands again

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Crete Nature Almanack 2018 – Summer

Image
Summer is here, the temperatures are regularly over 30C (86F) and sometimes over 40C (104F), so there is only one place to be; the sea. The shallow waters are teeming with fish like these (Yellowtail Barracuda I think) whilst Brittlestars clamber among the rocks and Sea Hares mate among the seaweed fronds.



Flowers are few and far between in the height of summer but as you wander along the beach look out for Sea Daffodils, Yellow Horned Poppies and Sea Rocket.



If you wander inland through the grasses see if you can find some of these amazingly beautiful insects. It's a Cretan Bright Bush Cricket and you'll only find it here on Crete (if you're lucky!)



And finally... towards the end of August watch out for the massed congregations of European Barn Swallows as they gather together for their migration to sub-Saharan Africa.


The Extra Bit
The Crete Nature Blog will take its annual summer vacation now but I'll be back in the autumn with more delights of the Cretan countryside. Ha…
Read more

The Reasons Behind The Excessive Rainfall

Image
Out & About
Do you remember that old stone bridge that we crossed atMirtos last month? The one where I suggested that whheelchair users would probably find it more practical to use the adjoining concreted ford? No longer; the ford was washed away last week in the fifth major deluge to hit our island this year. We have had more rain so far this year than the total rainfall for any of the preceding ten years.
I thought that we'd take a walk down to the cliffs today to see how Ferma, which lies between Myrtos and Makry Gialos, has fared. But as we wend our way down through the olive groves I'll try to explain what is happening and it is down to our old friend (or new enemy) climate change. Simply put, the temperature of the Earth is slowly rising but it is not constant around the globe. Here in south east Crete we are just under a degree celcius warmer than we were ten years ago which is much greater than the global average. Warmer air holds more moisture and it has a tendancy …
Read more

Water, Water, Everywhere

Image
January has been a wet month in these parts. The average rainfall over the past ten years, according to my little rain gauge, has been 83mm. This year we have had over 150mm. It was particularly wet last week when some fool with a digger started terraforming the olive grove behind the house and unleashed a torrent that found its way, unerringly, to the small hole where the co-axial cable enters my lounge. My thanks to Demos Ierapetras (AKA the local council) who sorted the problem promptly and efficiently and limited my discomfort to mere paddling.




Out & About
However, the sun has managed to break out this morning so let us walk along by the normally dry river beds and see and hear them gushing with exuberance. Alongside the Poppy Anemones, Mandrakes and Friar's Cowls that we saw in Toplou Gorge earlier this month the Broad-leaved Anemones, (Anemone hortensis) and Salad Rocket (Eruca sativa) have also started to come into flower. Not that I'm into making salads in this wea…
Read more