I've always had a love of the natural world - earliest childhood memories are of watching frog spawn, collected from a local pond develop into tadpoles in a small fish tank on the kitchen windowsill; pressing flowers in a nature study book, growing peas and beans in a jam jar with blotting paper, -simple things, but to a city girl like me they were all I had. A 20 minute bus ride away took me to the quiet of the South Downs and the bigger world of wild flowers,birds and butterflies. In the other direction was the seaside an equally rich habitat for me to explore.
This was my grounding, my beginning, and I went on to study the plants and animals, that had forged my early interest in the natural world. My career as a vet followed. Then an interest in ecology and how the species interacted, slowly developed over the years.
Now I'm retired and can walk each day on the Mendip Hills I can enjoy the flowers, the birds and butterflies at my leisure, but this pleasure is tinged with sadness that many species that I knew as a child, are either extinct in this country or so rare that they have to be protected.
Too late the world is realising what havoc has been created in the name of progress.
Local footpath with original stone stile -a rare site these days.
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