Paying Ready Attention

I stand on the sandy footprinted beach, look out to sea, watch the waves and wonder; are any of these waves the reflected after shadows of the Japanese tsunami? Are any of these the haunted wave memory of the shifted seabed, the plunging aftershock, the tortured water that came ashore like a strange spreading cloud? I doubt it, but the very idea brings the need for stillness and thought. If you had ever seen such things, how could you look out to sea or even stand on land and not believe that lasting change, random change, could occur at any moment. If the sea can rise up, the land fall away and sweep all before it, how can you look at a hill or a wave and not feel the uncertainty of fear? If the foundations of the earth can be torn apart, if the oceans can cover the land, how do you not feel fear each new coming second? The riches of the Earth boil to the surface in the very places where it is mobile and weakest. At plate boundaries, the intermittent slip slide of edges brings wealth...

I’m not sure when it all started, when it became impossible to walk over a bridge without looking over the edge. Without looking for fish. I’m not sure when it all started, when it became impossible to walk along a pier without looking over the edge. Without looking for fish. Beach edge, pond side, creek bank, it’s always the same. The search for the fin flash of silver. Salmon in the Leven, flooding from Windermere, chub in the Somerset Brue chasing finger squeezed flakes of bread, surface swirls for floating crusts. Toad fish by Swan Bay Pier, bright sun surf whiting at Point Lonsdale. But more often than not I can’t put a name to the fish - mystery fish below a bridge or darting, shadow scared, in rock pools. Fin after fin breaking the surface of Broom harbor - maybe more fish than I have ever seen in one place - all without a name. Sometimes you see more than fish, a passing crab, the single swirl of an otter under a bridge, a water vole; but mostly it’s fish. Standing on the brid...

Trying to catch shore birds is a matter of hurry up and wait, hurry up and wait. Setting the net needs to be done as quickly as possible, camouflaged, and attached to the cannons and then left. Sometimes the birds need to be encouraged to move into the catching area - twinkled as we call it. But for the most part it’s just a matter of sitting and waiting, sipping bitter flask coffee. The crackle of radio messages - “25 birds in the catching area”, “What just put the birds up?” “Peregrine”, “Arm” “three, two, one - fire”. All hell breaks loose when the small red button on the firing box is finally pushed. Such a small button, such a lot of action. Birders, normally a sedate (some would say sedated) and reserved lot, now in the guise of banders, sprint for the net. Most put in an Olympic A qualifying time, many pull muscles, some lose their shoes, some fall and lose their dignity. A few years ago I broke a toe dashing towards a net of damp birds, but only found out about it a few hours ...