Pigs

Sleeping or keeping her eye on the little mix and match piglets?

Not much sleeping with this lively bunch.

I like pigs and their personalities but they do have a certain porcine pong when in enclosed spaces

so perhaps best appreciated in the open air.

Along with the pecking

and perching hens.

I leave the last words to Piglet and Winnie the Pooh

An entry to ABC Wednesday, a journey through the alphabet, this week sojourning at P here

Otters

There was a lot of rather cute squeaking going on near the gate to the otter pool at the Cotebrook Shire Horse Centre.  Why?  The otters are fed at designated times through the day and this fence faces the direction where the purveyor of tasty nibbles will walk.

At last the fish have arrived.  Should I eat it this way?

 Or sideways?

Delicious.

I'm eating mine down here in the cooling stream. 

 These are Asian Short Clawed Otters (the smallest otter in the world) and the photo above shows its small claws with incomplete webbing between the digits.  This enhances their manual dexterity, useful when feeding on molluscs and crabs.  These adorable creatures also have a crowd pleasing trick of juggling stones on their hands, it is a very social species which likes to play.   Unfortunately I did not capture one of them doing their party trick as the stone was dropped immediately the fish arrived. 

 

and they got to grips with their silver slipperiness.

The Asian Short Clawed Otters here are a family, Robbie, Daisy and their offspring Dili. The species are on the Red List meaning they are vulnerable to extinction due to habitat loss and also hunting for their skins and also their organs which are used in traditional Chinese medicine. In the wild they live in mangrove swamps and fresh water wetlands with a range from India to South East Asia as shown on the map below.

This little family were more local and relocated to Cotebrook from Chester Zoo who are running a breeding program to increase their numbers and create new breeding lines.

I hope this helps their numbers increase.  Our own indigenous European Otters had a catastrophic decline in the 1950s and 60s due to pollution, habitat destruction and drainage of wetlands and almost completely disappeared from England (a Scottish population remained).  With positive action, the banning of organo-chloride pesticides and the improvement of river quality, over the years our otters have returned, so maybe there is hope for the Asian Short Clawed Otter.

An entry to ABC Wednesday, a journey through the alphabet, this week sojourning at O here 

Newfield Inn

A grouping of different communication systems in the Duddon Valley, post box, phone box and electricity substation. The notice directs the visitor to extra parking for the Newfield Inn but as it is mid afternoon on a Monday

parking won't be a problem. The Newfield Inn squeezes itself in a corner between a house and a bank barn in the hamlet of Seathwaite.  I don't know the inn's age, and neither does anyone else, sources put it at 16th, 17th or 18th century, take your pick, could be all three.  It is possible the poet William Wordsworth stopped here when visiting Seathwaite and perhaps he penned some of his Duddon sonnets in one of the rooms, although more poetically when he wrote 'To The River Duddon' one of the lines said he "left his verses gummed to your rocks like lichen"

The shape of a 1950s Morris Minor cabriolet outside is instantly recognisable, and its owner is taking advantage of the warm sunny day with the top down and although there are clouds there are none of the nimbus ones which bring rain.  If not for the modern blue car I could masquerade this photo as being taken half a century ago.

The occupants of the cottage opposite the Newfield Inn don't have far to walk for a meal, drinks or good company.  There is a blue for sale notice up at the front, which is round the corner.  If you have £550,000 to spare (five bedrooms, detached barn (out of view) and garden) its yours.

An entry to ABC Wednesday, a journey through the alphabet, this week sojourning at N here 

Sping into Autumn

 Cherry Blossom in May

and

its berries in October, both bring delight under sparkling blue skies.

Mushrooms

Perhaps one could imagine this mushroom bird feeder as a gnome or fairies high rise house.  It is peaceful surrounds, one of the trees among the ruins

of Kirkstall Abbey, once a Cistercian monastery now part of a public park by the north bank of the River Aire.  Everything was still green when this picture was taken in September however move on a month and the autumn colours are advancing with

mushrooms springing up in the woods, non more profuse than these Brittle Caps.  I'll stick to the common name so don't ask me what type they are but they all like the damp and growing on old tree stumps. One variety of brittle cap whose name I like, and perhaps it could be the one I show, is called Psathyrella multipedata, the Latin multipedata means 'many feet' because each grow on top the other 'feet' in clusters.  Little mushroom posies.

An entry to ABC Wednesday, a journey through the alphabet, this week sojourning at M here