THE LAST CATERPILLAR- DIARY OF (by me, not caterpillar, obviously)

Day 1 – it’s midwinter and that means rain and more rain, and, it’s cold, sometimes with light frosts. So,  I was astonished to see a Monarch caterpillar on the last and severely pruned Swan Plant in my garden. It didn’t look good and would die outdoors if we had a cold snap, so decided to bring it indoors at sunset. It’s quite small and seems thin  – the black stripes are too close together and the yellow almost hidden by them. Need to bring it indoors or it will die. Will do so at sunset as there is a bit of sun today, which may encourage it to eat.

Tucked up in bed, with thunder and lightning accompanying a deluge – oh no, forgot the caterpillar!

Day 2 – Still drizzling, but  go in search of the last caterpillar. No sign of it. Feeling really guilty about its soggy demise.

Day 3 – Sun bravely sending out a few lukewarm rays. Half heartedly look for the caterpillar – just in case. To my astonishment, it’s there, looking very shabby and shrunken, now it’s almost black. Not good.

Cut off the twig it is clinging to and bring it inside. Put the twig in a jam-jar of water with plastic wrap over the mouth – for the caterpillar’s safety – and place it in a sunny spot where it can warm up so that it can recommence eating.

Day 4 –has been eating apace and seems a bit bigger and fatter. Have high hopes for its future as a butterfly.

Davy 5 – Really tucking into the leaves on the new twig – ample proof of this on the paper towel  under jam-jar.

Day 6 – Still eating enthusiastically. Goes into a sort of trance when the sun starts setting or the temperature drops. Most grateful for the unexpected spell of warmish, sunny weather as it will help the caterpillar grow quickly so that it can pupate.

Day 7 – Can’t believe my eyes, another two caterpillars on the same depleted bush. One the size of the “last” caterpillar when I found it – can see now how much it has grown – and a very small one, which, sadly, expires during the very cold night despite being brought inside. At least its death didn’t go un-noticed and I shall dispose of its remains respectfully.

Day 8 – Neither of the surviving caterpillars starts eating still after 10am. Hope this doesn’t set them back. Still hoping for a Monarch butterfly or preferably two.

Day 9 – Caterpillar no 2 expires without warning.

Day 10 to 12 (or so – distracted by other things so forgot to write in the diary) – Caterpillar fat and shiny with yellow, black and white bands clearly discernible. Looks good except that it is very quiet, meditating on its future perhaps. Empties its stomach contents and doesn’t eat again.

Day 13 (or so) – It is a bit restless and seems to be inspecting its twig. Hope its suitable.

Day 14 – Twig has passed muster and caterpillar has attached its bottom to the twig with a silken pad (also from its bottom). It is just hanging about like an upside down question mark.

Day 16 – Something must happen soon as the caterpillar needs to turn into a green pupa (chrysalis) and hasn’t been doing anything about it yet. Decide to watch it all day. Time goes by and it’s like the watched pot. Distracted by something.  Suddenly remember, and return to find it is doing things behind my back. With sudden convulsive movements it is writhing itself into a green sheath from the head upwards towards the tail until it is solid green – the light green of the Swan Plant (Milkweed) on which it feeds. The thicker head section narrows whilst the tail section increases in girth. Eventually, it’s happy with its new shape and colour and is still once more. At the tail end there’s a black, crumpled skin which later falls off.

Day 20 - 28 – Nothing much happening, except it is taking on a blue-ish tinge which later turns brown and almost black. The skin is transparent now and the wings are discernible.

Day 29 – The chrysalis has just split down the back and a damp blog is struggling through the split. Finally, a crumpled small-winged, fat-bodied butterfly emerges. It rests briefly,  manoeuvres itself under the twig and hangs upside down. It is now pumping the liquid from its body into the wings which excruciatingly slowly expand to full size and shape. Sigh of relief, thought it might be disabled. It then inconsiderately squirts what must have been excess liquid onto my table. The first lot is red and the next couple of offloads somewhat lighter in colour.

It remains upside down, wiping its face with a little protuberance and begins to fan its still damp wings.

By now, it is seeing clearly and its head turns, following me as I move about observing it closely from various angles. It is also moving its antennae and gently rocking from side to side whilst furling and unfurling its long curled up tongue.

It excretes the last of the fluid from its body which is now slim and elongated and climbs to the top of the plant and then onto the curtain which hangs conveniently close until it reaches the rail.

It is a girl! She doesn’t have the male’s dark spots. As she’s the fourth generation of this summer, she will live through the winter (hopefully) and breed next season.

After several hours of pre-flight checks and much wing exercising, she takes her maiden flight!  It’s short and ends with a crash-landing on the table.  She tries a few more and then, as it’s another dry, warmish day, I hold out my hand so she can climb aboard for a trip outside where I hold up my hand and the breeze gives lift-off. She’s airborne and soars up and away.

I wish her well and hope she really is the last of the butterflies – the Swan plant is denuded.

A BROKEN LAMB

While I was working for an international AID organisation, the overwhelming exposure to poverty, pain, putrid conditions and hideous cruelty had me wanting to turn a blind eye and walk away – pretend it didn’t exist.

But, then, unexpectedly, an angel would turn up.

The most beautiful one I ever met was on the Cape flats – a little ‘Coloured’ (mixed race) girl whom I called Michelle in the original story that I wrote for the agency.

Her little bushy pigtails showed someone had cared enough, for a while at least, to dress her hair sometime in the not too distant past.

The rags she wore were as filthy as she. A club foot,  ruined face – eyes too wide apart, flattened nose, cleft palate – and the worst, urine trickling uncontrolled down her misshapen little legs. How raw and burnt she must have been, this ruined angel.

She was sitting on the pavement with her feet in the gutter along with three other urchins when we got out of the vehicle. But, she was the one who got up, hobbled towards me and tried to smile a greeting.

There was one last lollipop in my pocket. I unwrapped it and handed it to her. Her eyes lit up with delighted surprise as she thanked me wordlessly. Then, she crossed to the other little urchins and gave each a lick first before savouring the rare treat herself.

For a brief moment our Creator and Saviour let me see with His eyes and I understood why He still has patience with us – it’s because of His special lambs.

MA MOHAU

She was a tiny, wizened woman when I met her many years ago. Sister Enid Barber. An Anglican nun and nurse in the African township near Bloemfontein. Aids had just made its scrofulous and leprous appearance and was claiming its first victims.

Sister Enid had started with a handcart when she was a young nursing and religious sister fresh from England at the end of the Great War to end all wars – yeah right! Apartheid had not been born yet, but poverty had – a long, long time before, as we all know. She had come for those who were its chief victims. She took her handcart into the townships, the Black Ghettoes, dispensing medical care and the true gospel of unconditional love.

She had soon moved on to a donkey drawn cart, then a horse ambulance and finally a motorised ambulance. Meanwhile the authorities had built a hospital to which she could ferry her lambs.

Her own work, however, never changed. She tended, nursed, fed and rescued the poorest of the poor.

One of her lambs was a little boy with rickets. We visited him in ‘her’ hospital. She’d found him abandoned on the streets, like Charlie, a little boy I met in Johannesburg. But he’s another story. The spidery-limbed little boy’s face lit up with joy as the gentle nun stroked his face and spoke lovingly to him. She lingered with him, her special lamb and then moved on to others who were dying of the mystery ailment. To each one she ministered love and tenderness.

When there was rioting and it was not safe for whites to be in the African townships, she was there, still dispensing love and medicines without a thought of retiring despite approaching 90 years of age. 

She was never harmed by even the most radical and angry of rioters. She was one of the people, you see.

The Sotho people, whom she so loved that she gave her life for them, called her, Ma Mohau, Mother of Mercy.  Even the angriest and most violent of the young people recognised someone who had heard and heeded the Great Shepherd’s injunction: “Feed My Lambs!”

African Lambs

You may wonder why I write about animals. It keeps me sane.
I’ll explain.
Many years ago I was working for a GMO in Africa. One day a report
appeared on my desk. It was from an international group, a powerful and very
wealthy group.
The contents:
The world was divided into five regions – wealth the criterion.
There was the first world, of course, the second (Russia inter alia) and
the third – no explanation required.
But, then there were the fourth and fifth ‘worlds’. Couched in PC language,
it was stated that they would never catch up and so were consigned to the trash
bin. The populations of these countries would ‘die out ‘through internecine
fighting and disease.
Guess where they were?
Africa mainly, but also some countries in South East Asia.
Have you ever noticed how most of the famines, diseases and wars are in
these countries, especially Africa? Then, of course, there are the blood
diamonds, corrupt dictatorships undergirded by ? – I’m sure you can guess.
Some years later, I attended a lecture by a medical doctor from Brazil.
She had worked with an international AID organisation. She was a conspiracy
theorist and showed her map of the early AIDS areas in Africa then superimposed
over this map one of the inoculation programme of an international medical aid
organisation. Guess what – they coincided perfectly! Co-incidence?
Others seems to share this
conspiracy theory mindset as the film, The Constant Gardener, based on John le
Carre’s novel, demonstrates. Here, the
Africans (as happens in India) are unwitting guinea-pigs for pharmaceutical
giants.
So you see, the African lambs have been, are and will continue to be led
unknowingly to the slaughter, collateral damage in the great quest for wealth -
for the few – and medical miracles, again for the few.

 GULL GRATITUDE

As the blog suggests, I love animals and have been a rescuer of all things furry and feathered and even some with scales, or not.

I’ve rescued and sometimes successfully rehabilitated kingfishers, sparrows, hawks, owls, albatrosses, gannets and swallows, inter alia. All were interesting, but the seagull was the most unusual.

A beautiful pastiche of soft grey and white feathers, it had a dark bill and legs, hence a juvenile.

A friend had rung me earlier to say there was an injured seagull on the beach.

It was immediately apparent that it had become entangled in fishing line and looked a sorry sight with its wings trapped at its sides.

After a short stay in a dark box – to settle it down – I fed it some pilchards.

A fish-hook caught in the shoulder muscle had been there some time as the wound had healed around it.

After carefully removing the hook, I unwound the fishing line that had bound the wings so tightly. The gull lay quietly on my lap for the duration of the procedure.  It seemed to know it was being helped.

Another rest and feed and a testing of the wings (holding the body whilst letting it flap its wings), and it was time for release. I knew it would take a day or two before it could fly properly, but as it had come from a safe beach and had a crop-full of the cat’s fish, it would not be an issue releasing it close to the water where it could bathe and get rid of any lice that may have made their way onto it, as well as, hopefully, finding something to eat now that it was more mobile.

The release was to prove the only problem.

It refused to leave its perch, clinging determinedly to my hand with its paddle feet. I had to lift it off and place it on the sand

It was a relief seeing it finally scuttle off and head for the water. I wished it ‘bon voyage’ and a good life as it blended with the other gulls.

But, wait, that’s not all, there’s more!

Two days later, a juvenile gull landed on my back fence and sat there until I went out and greeted it. It allowed me to approach very closely, cocked its head, and, then, after a long eye-balling, flew off.

The same gull? Who knows? What I can say is that no other gull had done that before – they don’t come into my yard, courtesy of Bonnie, the Killer Maltese – and no gull has done so since.

I believe all animals are much smarter than we give them credit for. And, who's to say gulls can’t have grateful hearts! I like to think he/she came to say, “I’m okay, and by the way, thanks!”

A Couple of Swallows

Being called a bird-brain is a great compliment. Imagine the tiny head of a swallow containing a brain that can navigate continents and oceans, build a nest of mud and saliva so strong that it can be used over and over. A marvellous micro-chip that is as quick as its flight, turning and twisting, dipping and darting. It turns fighter pilots green with envy.

Many years ago, a little boy brought me a swallow with a broken wing.  As I held the delicate bird weighing only a gram or two (okay, maybe three), it seemed that it would not live long. The little heart raced and the tiny black eyes were fixed on my face. How could something so fragile survive the trauma and if it did, what would life be like for a non-flying swallow.

I rang a bird rescue centre close-by and was told to bring the bird in the next day. They would be able to tell me if the wing could be fixed.

This was not my first encounter with a swallow. Previously, I’d heard a woman screaming in the motel unit beside mine. A swallow was flying about her room and she was trying to bat it with a broom. It was terrified and exhausted so I caught it gently in the curtain and then held it in one hand with the other covering it so that it was in a dark warm place. Birds tend to drop off to sleep at once in a dark place. After a short while, I opened my hand and it looked up at me curiously. As I was outside, I  flattened my palm so that it could take off. For some time it lay there and then when I gave a small encouraging flip of my hand, it finally soared off and disappeared from view.

This new one would need full time care. It would also require regular feeding to keep it from dying of hunger – small birds have amazingly fast metabolisms so need to eat constantly – and be kept warm and quiet.

First – the dark and warm box.  Then, armed with a fly swatter, off to search for flies and other insects to feed my voracious little friend.

I fed the flies on tweezers and was delighted to see that it took them readily.

Back to the box for the swallow and back to swatting flies for me. The second time, I held out my finger and the little bird climbed onto it with its short, cotton-thin legs invisible beneath the downy tummy feathers. Its tiny claws were equally delicate filaments. This time it took its feed even more enthusiastically.

Rather than put it back into the box, I lay down and put it on my chest where it sat quietly for some time and watched me trying to read my book. As soon as it began to stir, the feeding was repeated. I did this several times before dusk when I was able to consign it to the box for the night.

The next morning, it was as tame as the day before and eager to get on with breakfast.

At the bird shelter and hospital, I was delighted when the wing was strapped up. The break was clean and my brave little friend would fly again.

This pure soul taught me that courage optimism and uncanny wisdom can come in very tiny packages.

SMART SHEEP

I wanted to make real Haloumi cheese, so I acquired 2 day-old East Friesan lambs, Daisy and Rosemary. All their family had botanical names, so I kept the tradition.

Snoodles was obsessed with them from day one. They in turn, loved and accepted her immediately as a potential mother and milkbar. Their udder-seeking head-butts were their sole and inadvertent retaliations to her rough games.

If lambs, without ovine mothers to teach them better, have an outstanding quality, it is their total trust. No doubt the result of their own mild natures.

Then, they never complain. When they got flystrike, which seems inevitable in Northland summers, I was distraught, but they didn't murmur, just lay down and looked sad. The treatment must have caused some distress as I tried scraping off the monstrous maggots to see how deep they'd burrowed into the tender pink skins. The powder applied to their wounds must have caused some discomfort, but not a sound - like a lamb to the slaughter and the silence of the lambs are true epithets.

And, they have no sense of revenge. Daisy loved me ever after and would come running at the sound of my voice, her lambs at her heels.

Stupid animals? Not at all!

Basil, Daisy's first ram lamb whom I gave to friends, a gentle and friendly fellow who had never been handled other than once for his injections and de-tailing, is evidence for the defence.

Three years after he'd gone to 'stud' - a prolific sire of mainly twins and some triplets - I visited his owners who were shearing.

As I was chatting to one, suddenly, a loud bleat, a ram rushing up to me, and then my hand being licked. It was Basil. He remembered me.

Truly, My sheep know My voice.