Nature
6th June 2009
I have a squirrel nesting outside my window. The window is covered with a rattan blind, so she has built the nest sandwiched between the glass and the blind. I get a good view of what is going on in the life of the squirrel.
Last week I had another of our long dark black wriggly visitors. A small cobra came into the bakery, probably trying to catch the frogs that come in. They are able to come in, because we have a rather large gap under our main entrance door. Today I went to Ace department store at the Ikano Centre and bought a plastic strip which you fit to the bottom of the door, so that it scrapes the floor as the door opens and shuts. It will keep most crawlies out when the door is shut. In England we use them to keep cold drafts of air from blowing in under the door. You can find the strips in the door-lock and fittings section. I bought the cheap ones at 9.90RM, but they do have de-luxe ones at +-40 RM. I have used one of the cheaper ones on the door to my cabin for several years and it still works fine.
6th April 2009
I had to bake this morning so I took my keys to the Bakery and left my living quarters. Now normally I can select the correct key in the darkness and go straight in with out any fuss. Today I selected the wrong key from the bunch and then felt something biting my feet. I quickly nipped back to my quarters where the light was on, to find my feet and legs were covered in Red Ants. Aagh! I quickly ran for the shower and washed my legs and feet with soap. The ants do not like the soap and the soap eases the stings. I then went back to investigate. Someone, who shall remain nameless had left a bag of rubbish by the side of the door and I guess the ants sensing something tasty, moved in with the intention of carrying it all back to their nesting place. In fairness to whoever left the rubbish bag there, at one time we used to have monkeys come around and rip all the rubbish left in the bins to pieces, spreading it all over the road and neighbours gardens.
So there are perils to living in the country. I mentioned above that we used to have Monkeys coming round. That was the case till someone cleared all the trees off plot of land that they used to inhabit. I am not sure if the purpose was to develop the land or just to clear the Monkeys out. I had heard the villagers were not happy by their periodic invasion. We used to get 30 - 40 of them in our garden and they casued no real trouble except eat some of the Papyas and their leaves. Anyway I did see a lone Monkey a few days ago. Perhaps he is one of the few left in our area.
March 2009
It is a real pleasure to be living here in the village. I am surrounded by creatures, some are demonstrative and showy, others secretive and shy. The birds are always around, flying in and out of the tall grasses one minute and up in the trees the next. One thing I noticed here is that the birds are quite small compared to England. Looking out of my daughters lounge window I initially thought she had chickens in the garden, but no, they were just enormous common crows and pigeons. I have an Asian cherry tree in my garden so the birds like to come and eat the fruit. As most of the fruit are unatainable to us non-flying humans, they are most welcome to them
We have three cats running around. Two outside cats and one cat whose domain is the house and bakery. With them around, we do not see any mice! The inside cat is called BeBe, she turned just over two years ago and did not want to leave, so we adopted her. She is very spoiled and very afraid of strangers. Most visitors will never see her. The other two, just live in and around the garden
We have other more secretive creatures, squirrels, snakes, toads, lizards and once we had a family of some kind of wild cat.
How many creatures can you see in your garden?