Learning to see

Having celebrated the joyful hope of new life at Easter with a great feast at my brother's house (thanks Mick!) I have a new challenge for the next seven weeks up to Pentecost: I want to learn to recognise more wildlife.

As an engineer, it's obvious that I notice different things than other people in the landscape because I know what I'm looking for and I'm interested in what things are for. So on train rides, I notice radio masts, retaining walls and rock netting and as a cyclist I know every set of traffic lights on my routes around York. I know which ones are old fashioned and based on a fixed sequence and timing, which are camera controlled (eg PUFFIN crossings which allow elderly and disabled people more time to cross) and which rely on pressure pads in the road to detect traffic wanting to turn (which don't work when you're not as heavy as a car!)

But while I enjoy seeing flowers in gardens and have learned to tell the difference between a courgette and a bean plant by growing them myself, I often don't know the names of the trees, plants, butterflies and birds I see every day when out and about - and I think that's a shame.
The rich diversity of God's creation is something that we all rely on (more on "ecosystem services" another time…) and it's all too easy to be an urban-based campaigner on climate change without a real knowledge of the nature I'm trying to protect.

So the challenge is to learn how to identify at least five species a week (hopefully including edible ones with the help of Richard Mabey's book "Food for Free"). The challenge is not just to learn their leaves or flowers from a book, but to get outside and find an example of at least one species each week as well! This week, I'm going to look up trees, especially the "blossom tree" flowering in my garden at the moment - I don't think it's a cherry tree because last year we had no cherries, so what is it?

Another part of the challenge is to see the landscape and habitats as a whole: at school we studied a poem about Romney Marsh which celebrated the wild beauty of the place and the vastness of the marsh and open sky, threatened by a road to be built through the middle of it - according to some, it was "ripe for development". Do I really want to be that kind of engineer? Or do I want to develop a love for the natural world that comes from seeing how the different parts interact and rely on each other? One definition of wisdom is insight, being able to discern what's really going on in a situation and to understand it. But it seems to me that this relies on good observation - before insight, you need first to spot that there is something worth seeing! "The heavens declare the glory of God" according to the Psalmist - but how much of this do I take the time to notice?

See also:
What a Wonderful World!
Why Tread Lightly?