The Reasons Behind The Excessive Rainfall

Out & About

Do you remember that old stone bridge that we crossed at Mirtos 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 to drop this in torrential downpours.

Flood pictures from news 24 7 and Kreta MakryGialos

Somehow we seem to have missed the worst of it. Just a bit of extra water flowing down the gully which the birds are enjoying. There's a Corn Bunting down there look which I don't often see in these parts and, rarer still, a pair of Purple Heron flying over the sea. With all this fresh water laying around it seems strange that they should choose to come to the coast. Maybe they're spoiled for choice. And... I've just seen the first swallows of the year. They seem to be getting later, they used to turn up in the middle of March ten years or so back.

“They seek him here, they seek him there,

Those Frenchies seek him everywhere
Is he in heaven or is he in hell?
That demned elusive Pimpernel”

Thus rhymed Baroness Orczy in her novel, The Scarlet Pimpernel. Well, here it is, the diminutive flower after which her hero is named. A toxic little weed (the flower, not the hero), particularly to livestock. Humans fed with experimental doses of the essential oil suffered intense nausea, headaches and bodily pain. The ancient Greeks used it as an antidepressant, presumably on the grounds that all that suffering takes your mind off your less tangible woes.

Fieldcraft & Foraging

There are quite a lot of insects about this morning including these three which turn up regularly in the last week of March or the first week of April. The exact date is linked to conditions such as light levels and temperature, which determine when the flowers start to bloom and thus, directly or indirectly, when food is available. As such, you can use insects as a rough temperature guide. An American chap took this to extremes apparently and calculated that 40 + (the number of chirps made by the Snowy Tree Cricket in 14 seconds) = the temperature in degrees Farenheit. He obviously had a lot of time on his hands to come up with that particular piece of fieldcraft.

In The Lab

The Painted Ladies are still about but in lesser numbers and last week I sent a batch of specimens off to the Vanessa cardui migration project for DNA testing. The point of this, as with all studies of plant, insect and other bird and animal migrations is to spot changes in migratory behaviour. For eventually, where the wildlife goes so too will our own species. 'Climate Refugees' is a term that we will hear more and more in the years to come and if we can use our observations of nature to predict where and when human migration will occur then maybe, just maybe, the governments of the world can prepare.

Crete Nature Catch-up
Series 1 - Welcome to Lasithi	Series 2 - The Rhythm Of Life	Series 3 - A Journey Begins
Series 4 - The Milonas Valley	Series 5 - This Is Ferma	Series 6 - Upland Villages
Series 7 - The Forty saints	Series 8 - Sunday Strolls	Series 9 - (Current series start)

Steve's Books (well, just the one at the moment)

Not Just For Twisted Women by Steve Daniels  A light-hearted look at life through the eyes of the fairer sex. Kindle Edition 1.99 pounds sterling (or equivalent). Paperback Edition 4.99 pounds sterling (or equivalent).. Read snippets, samples and stuff at Steve's Books

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LINKS:

Share your nature thoughts, photos and comments on Naturalists (the facebook page that accompanies this blog)

Explore the region with the #CreteNature interactive Hiking and Nature Map

Cretan Flora Flowers of Crete BIRDS OF CRETE Crete Birding

Greek Butterflies and Moths Aquaworld Aquarium

Visit Greece (National Government Tourist Office)

Along the Ardefsi

After last week’s somewhat arduous trek, both physically from the top to bottom of the Milonas valley and mentally through the annals of evolution, I thought we’d reward ourselves this week with a quiet walk along an ardefsi. To be more precise an ardefsi kanali or, in English, a less poetic sounding irrigation canal. These little concrete canals were built to take water from the hills and mountains to the farmlands below but nowadays have fallen into disuse, replaced by ubiquitous black plastic pipes that snake their way across the landscape like so much spaghetti negro. In truth, they are not too obtrusive as they soon get covered with a layer of brown dust and begin to blend in. So with the sun shining across a millpond like sea, the sky turning a shade of cornflower blue and the first Swifts of the year wheeling overhead and uttering their shrill squeaks of delight let us sally forth along the ardefsi and see where it leads us.

Cistus, Star Clover and Pimpernel

The swifts? Yes they usually appear at any time from mid March to the end of April along this part of the coast. Last year I didn’t see them until the end of May which either means that they were delayed or I was being unobservant, both of which are possible. But what have we here? See how the ardefsi has filled up with earth over the years providing a microhabitat for some of our smaller flowers. Shielded by the ridge behind and in the lee of the pink flowering cistus bush we have some Star Clover (those of you with long memories will remember that we found this and other clovers last Spring out at Bramiana Reservoir) and some Scarlet Pimpernels. Yes, I know that they are blue but if you’ve read Baroness Orczy’s novel of the same name you will recall that Sir Percy Blakeney, the eponymous hero of the story, was a master of disguise. There are three forms of this flower: orange, red and blue. Personally I have only seen the orange and blue forms out here, never the red. I seek it here, I seek it there, …that demned elusive Pimpernel. Sorry, getting a bit carried away there.

Robber Flies mating on a fallen Pine

It would seem that our path is not going to be as easy as we thought. We’ve already had to clamber up and down the hillside a couple of times to avoid dense shrubbery and now a fallen pine tree is blocking our way. However, fallen trees are always good for a find or two and this one I see is providing a marital bed for a pair of Robber Flies. Now this is interesting: Fauna Europea only lists one species of Robber Fly out here, Cerdistus creticus, which we had the pleasure of meeting whilst walking round The Bottomless Lake of Agios Nikolaos but these look slightly different. We’ll send some pictures off to a few experts and see what they make of them. Now, do we go over, under or round? Over I think.

Longhorn Beetle among the Yellow Asphodels

The fallen tree seems to have presaged a slight descent around a pine cloaked valley which will give us a bit of welcome shade. It really is getting quite hot today. Is it my imagination or is that stretch of our canal opposite us going uphill? Never underestimate the powers of Greek geometry. I see we still have some of our old friends the Yellow Asphodels in flower down here in the cool depths although most of them are now setting seed and looking like stalks of tiny Golden Delicious apples. A couple of weeks back on our walk to The Chamomile Lawn we found the dying flowers full of Orange Blossom Bugs but today we have a new visitor, a beautiful little Longhorn Beetle that goes by the name of Agapanthia. Just look at those magnificent black and white banded antennae.

Quaking Grass and Swallowtail Butterfly

With the valley dropping far away below us the ardefsi seems to be making a loop around the head of it. I wonder if we can peer over the edge? Wow! Another vertiginous chasm, we must find a way down into it at some point in the future, make a note will you? The rock face opposite looks quite damp, there may well be pools at the bottom teeming with interesting discoveries. But that’s for another day, let’s go and sit on the ardefsi and just soak in the sights, sounds and smells that surround us. There’s a beautiful warm breeze coming over from Africa and we’ve all the time in the world to relax and take it all in. This part of the ardefsi is full of little Quaking Grass, nodding their heads in approval of the Spring Sunshine and look, the first Swallowtail butterfly of the year and I do believe I saw a Clouded Yellow earlier, flitting through the pine trees like a slice of lemon on the wing. Ahh! Let’s just stay here in this idyllic spot all week shall we?



Until next week – happy hunting.




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LINKS:

Naturalists (the facebook page that accompanies this blog)

Flowers of Crete;

BIRDS OF CRETE

Crete Birding

Greek Butterflies and Moths

Aquaworld Aquarium

Visit Greece (National Government Tourist Office)