An innovative and simple campaign to reduce unnecessary light pollution.

Refresh the page to see another clever little animation.

And put that light out.

Trees attract rituals. People seem to find meaning in trees perhaps for their permanence, their size or simply their beauty. We often feel the need to mark this by some act. But here's one that, if you're on this side of the water, you probably won't know about. But I suspect that US and Canadian readers will by contrast say "Huh? Doesn't everyone do this?".

A chance photo seen on the evergreen UKTC forum showed a Canadian tree covered in shoes. And what appeared to be a one-off phenomenon turned out to be something that happens all across the US and Canada, and apparently beyond - although hardly at all in Europe. Like many of the more interesting aspects of the interaction between trees and humans, it seems there's more to this shoe and tree business than meets the eye.

Read the rest...

By Princess Tightwad, the parsimonious eco-warrior

Princess Tightwad likes bargain basement music. 100% Colombian by the Fun Lovin’ Criminals for 99p? Oh yes. I’ve written about the joys of charity shop CDs before. But legal music for free? Bring it on.

So when I stumbled upon www.last.fm while looking for an obscure track on the internet, I thought I’d discovered a pay-as-you-download unter-iTunes. But no, here is a site where you can create your own radio station of favourite music, play full tracks and not pay a penny. I don’t always want a full album. Lily Allen is a case in point: generally the Bedales-educated mockney socialite irritates me with her faux glottal (glo’al?) stops and perceptions, but I like a couple of her tracks. I don’t have an iPod. What to do? Log onto last.fm, listen to LND or Smile until they grate on you, then simply ban them from the playlist. What’s the catch? I haven’t found one (yet).

Read the rest...

At this time of year ponds are filling with mating amphibians. Frogs and toads have an unusual mating habit known as amplexus from the Latin word meaning 'embrace'. The male tightly grasps the female, and then waits in this posture until the eggs emerge, at which point he fertilizes them. This prevents other males from getting in first - although it doesn't stop them trying. It's not uncommon to see a whole ball of toads or, less commonly, frogs, made of males trying to clasp onto one unfortunate female underneath.

The urge to clasp is a strong one, and once attached, the male is hard to dislodge. Recently, visiting some friends The Ranger was asked 'Do you want to see a fish with a frog on its head?'. I did indeed want to see this, and from the murky waters of the garden pond the following spectacle was visible:

Excuse the fuzzy photo - it was hard to see, and this is the best I could do with artificial enhancements. However there's a much better video after the jump.

Read the rest...

By Ruth D'Alessandro, The Wildlife Gardener

The Wildlife Garden resembles a scene from CSI this week: Plastic tents, decontamination unit, men undressing in see-through cubicles, donning red suits and respirators, hazard notices and endless cups of tea. The postman asked me if we had ET in the garage. What is going on?

Readers of this column and my Twitter witterings will be familiar with the ongoing saga of the Wildlife House and Mr Idiot the cowboy builder’s attempts to wreck it before being unceremoniously ejected from the premises. This is the final, and most dangerous stage of the correction process.

Read the rest...

Watch this video, go on.

An unusual advert caught The Ranger's eye in his own sidebar:

Look carefully. Yes, that's right, the advert headed 'Wildlife trust' is actually pointing to a Woodland Trust website. When you click on it (I tried) it takes you to a page exhorting you to join the Woodland Trust.

Some mistake, possibly? There's keen competition between wildlife charities for members. The Wildlife Trusts are the big boys of wildlife charities - a powerful national federation of local trusts, with a lot of members. The Woodland Trust, by comparison, is a quarter the size, but pretty good at getting publicity.

I reckon the Wildlife Trusts wouldn't be too happy about this headline.

By Ruth D'Alessandro, The Wildlife Gardener

The green shoots of recovery have started to show, at least in the Wildlife Garden. Broad beans are up, as are module-planted seeds of aubergines, tomatoes, tomatillos, chillies (from mild to habañero) and sweet peppers. Snake’s head fritillaries, Crown Imperial lilies and chives bring spring green colour and buds appear on the shrubs. The Wildlife Pond is bubbling with big amphibians making little amphibians. Throaty males serenade bewildered females in Barry White bass tones before leaping on them. I counted at least twenty frogs, singly or in pairs, coyly plopping down under the surface whenever I approached, and many little common newts trundling around in the sunken leaves.

But with green shoots come the weeds too. Looks like the wretched blanket weed and duckweed I pulled out of the pond last November is growing back again. It practically choked it last year, and any attempt to fish it before autumn hauled up so many pond snails, dragonfly larvae and tadpoles that I put it all back in again.

Read the rest...

This is the third part of The Ranger's exploration of Genesis Expo, an exhibition which bills itself as "the biggest Creation Museum in the UK"; raising the question of where the others might be. Do report any sightings.

Parts one and two of the expedition report are available on this blog. This third part will report on the views of the visitors after leaving the exhibition - did they find themselves swayed by the arguments they had seen? Find out below.

Read the rest...

Genesis Expo is the UK's largest and most popular Creationist museum.

In a series of three articles on The Ranger's Blog you will find out what happened when The Ranger and the Wildlife Gardener - both unapologetic Darwinists - took a day off and visited Genesis Expo. Part one is already published; part two is below.

Read the rest...

By Ruth D'Alessandro, The Wildlife Gardener

"You're a naturist (sic), do you know anything about great crested newts?" a rather inebriated man asked The Wildlife Gardener at a party last week. For the purposes of this story, let's call him Mr Pinotage. I know a bit about newts, and in the case of the great crested, no newts is good news. Not because they're not utterly delightful, special creatures, rather because of the miles of red tape they trail along behind them.

I asked him what he wanted to know. He regaled me with the following story:

Read the rest...

Just opposite where the Isle of Wight ferry lands, a row of old shops and pubs sits picturesquely on Portsmouth Hard, in the shadow of the magnificent Victorian battleship HMS Warrior.

One of these, the old National Provincial Bank, is now home to the museum of the UK's Creation Science Movement. The Genesis Expo is described by the CSM as:

...12 dioramas and a clutch of real fossilised dinosaur eggs... A wide range of topics is examined and some of the displays are animated... They are all presented in an easily understood form for those with little knowledge of the enormous amount of scientific evidence that is against evolution and supports creation.

This is the UK's largest and most popular Creationist museum. In a series of three articles on The Ranger's Blog you will find out what happened when The Ranger and the Wildlife Gardener - both unapologetic supporters of Darwin's theory - took a day off and visited Genesis Expo. Part one is below.

Read the rest...

The Virtual Ranger isn't fond of memorial plaques and paraphernalia in public spaces. But occasionally, one has to give credit where credit is due, in this case to Eleanor Crum:

Read the rest...

Once more Find the Fault rides forth, and this one is a proper one from the box, don't worry.

Answers to FTF10 are now online.

The rules are simple; examine the card, find what's wrong, leave a comment below to spell it out. Points for all correct answers, and Nicholas Parsons-style bonus marks for entertaining or clever ones.

I'm not expecting the main answer to tax you too much here. But some good bonuses lurk, I think!

Answers below