Science & Nature

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SUNNY ‘D’

THE FORGOTTEN VITAMIN?

Robert Bygrave, Chair, Sherborne Science Café

Dr Oliver Gillie advised his audience at the May 2009 meeting of Sherborne Science Café to throw away their sunblock, along with most of their clothes – for as long as they could bare it! Explaining the benefits of vitamin D, which is made in the skin with the aid of sunlight, he told us that too much skin protection was bad for our health.

He pointed out that low levels of vitamin D were not only linked with rickets, but also osteoporosis, bowel cancer, arthritis, multiple sclerosis, diabetes and a weakened immune system. This would mean that the advice given by Cancer Research UK was the wrong advice for some people. In Western Europe, where light levels are relatively low, we need to get as much sun as we can. Only 5% of our daily needs comes from our diet. Therefore, his motto was: ‘Let the sunshine in!’ – particularly in Northern England and Scotland.

His unconventional message was greeted with some scepticism by the large audience. However, he pointed out that there was much research to support his claim, even in the BMJ. White skins had evolved from pigmented ones, in response to low light levels, when man migrated out of Africa before the last Ice Age. He advised that a daily dose of 1000-2000 units of vitamin D was therefore required by most people.

Dr Gillie was always a controversial scientist with a wide interest in health issues. He died recently on 15th May at the age of 83. With the summer arriving

– he would not have been the doctor to advise you to apply sun-cream. He was particularly interested in the health issues of Scotland and other countries of northern latitudes since he had noticed that they had a lot of similar health problems.

He realised that in Scotland more people of South Asian origin suffered from heart disease than South Asian people in England – even though they had similar ancestry, diets, and habits. His conclusion was that a lack of vitamin D was the fundamental issue with their health problems. He was aware that research showed that dark skins made six times less vitamin D than white skins when tested.

This meant that light skins would survive better in northern climates, and this had affected human migration in the last 80,000 years. However, in the darkest months insufficient vitamin D would be made by the skin. People with white skin would have this problem as they moved North. Rickets, a bone disease directly caused by a lack of this vitamin, was known as ‘The English Disease’ up to the discovery of the link in the 1820s.

We have been adding cod liver oil, rich in vitamin D, to our diet since the 1930s and in Scotland the government advises taking vitamin D supplements in the dark months from October to March.

It is also known, in this ‘COVID world’, to be a vital substance to fortify our immune systems.

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THE SHORE CRAB

Alex Hennessy, Marketing and Communications Officer, Dorset Wildlife Trust

Crabs are fascinating creatures, with the common shore crab being the one most often found in British waters. Not all shore crabs look the same though – their colours will differ depending on their habitat, age and whether it is breeding season. They are most often a greenish colour, but can be orange or even red.

If you’ve spotted a crab while rock-pooling or crabbing, it’s most likely to have been a shore crab. They are medium-sized with a shell (carapace) up to 8cm in width and can be identified by the pattern of spikes on their carapace. The shore crab has five upturned spikes on each side of the carapace and 3 rounded lobes between the eyes.

Shore crabs will feast on anything and everything they come across, including seaweed, mussels, barnacles and even smaller crabs. Around breeding season, a female may have an orange mass on its stomach – these are fertilised eggs, which females carry with them to protect from predators. A female with eggs is known as ‘berried’. Although a native species here in the UK, the shore crab has been introduced and become an invasive species in many other parts of the world, including Australia, South Africa and California.

Take a walk along any harbourside in Dorset, and you’ll see families enjoying the popular summer pasttime of crabbing. It’s a great way for people to get close to nature while spending time outside on warm summer days. However, it is also important to take a moment to think about how you’re caring for the crabs themselves, and the marine environment around you.

There are five easy-to-follow guidelines to ensure the safety of your catch: use a bait bag, not a hook; only keep a maximum of two crabs per bucket (return any fighting crabs); replace the seawater in the bucket every 10 minutes and keep the bucket in the shade; return all crabs to the sea gently, and take all the kit with you when you’re finished – especially taking care to remove plastic from the shoreline.

Learn more about wildlife in Dorset on the Dorset Wildlife Trust website: dorsetwildlifetrust.org.uk/wildlife

Crab facts

• The collective noun for crabs is a ‘cast’ • Shore crabs have a life-span of 5-10 years • Shore crabs moult, removing their shells periodically in order to grow

WILDLIFE ON THE VERGE

Simon Ford, Land and Nature Adviser, The John Lewis Partnership, Dorset Wildlife Trust Sherborne Group Member

Iwas reading in the paper this week that our roadside verges in the UK make up an area the size of Dorset. It brought me back to the period of lockdown, when our daily permitted exercise was to walk or cycle from our houses.

Sherborne is superbly situated, with a series of footpaths, bridlepaths and country lanes radiating out in all directions, into the local countryside. As a wildlife adviser, I sometimes get called to survey sites or provide ecological advice and, in many cases, these areas are sadly of much lower value for nature, than our verges here in West Dorset.

Early in spring, there is a yellow phase, with the first primroses, golden celandines and, on chalk and limestone, cowslips emerging. Sometimes, I see impressive false oxlips, which are a hybrid between primrose and cowslip. To cap it off are wonderful brimstone butterflies whose wings mimic a leaf and a flash of colour from male orange-tip butterflies. As the season progresses, wild garlic, stitchwort, hogweed, wild carrot and delightful cow parsley or Queen Anne’s lace, grow in profusion during the white period. This is when holly blue, peacock and ringlet butterflies are on the wing. Then, in the summer, it becomes a time of pinks and purples, with foxgloves, red campion, herb Robert, knapweed, scabious and, if we are lucky, orchids flowering. In the Sherborne area, we can see early purple orchids, common spotted, southern marsh, heath spotted, twayblades and occasional bee, and butterfly orchids on the verges of our highways and byways. Gatekeepers, meadow brown, marbled white and red admiral butterflies and cinnabar, silver ‘Y’ and burnet moths are a common sight.

It is not just flowers and butterflies to look out for, but also birds such as yellow hammers, song

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thrushes, wrens, goldcrests and long tailed tits. I have also seen barn owls hunting for small mammals living in the long vegetation – a dangerous activity sadly on busy roads. In the twilight, bats such as lesser horseshoes and pipistrelles look for insects to eat and navigate using hedges. Reptiles and amphibians, including slow worms, grass snakes, common lizards, frogs and toads can sometimes be seen and, unfortunately, road casualties indicate the presence of hedgehogs, foxes, roe deer, rabbits, badgers and occasional stoats and weasels.

The verges, like our hedges, create an interconnected corridor – if carefully maintained – and species such as dormouse will sometimes use them, especially where they connect areas of broad-leaved woodland. You may notice occasional signs saying, ‘Protected Verge’, such as at Dancing Hill (below the Terraces Playing Fields), where an excellent group of volunteers maintain the wildflower bank at the junction. These signs also tell the Highways staff that the areas need managing sensitively.

Where there are no safety concerns, such as junctions, wildlife will benefit from the verges remaining uncut – at least until mid-July, when many flowers will have set seed. Hedges should not be cut in the summer at all and, ideally, they should be allowed to grow larger and produce flowers and fruit. Wildlife will benefit - we will be rewarded with delightful displays of flowers and insects, and it will save a great deal of money and carbon in highway maintenance budgets! What’s not to like.

It is all too easy to flash by in a car and take our verges for granted but enjoy them slowly on foot or bicycle and you will no doubt find some gems and will feel much the better for it!

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LITTLE PEOPLE MAKING A BIG DIFFERENCE

Peter Littlewood, Young People’s Trust for the Environment

We’ve heard a lot in the media about the detrimental impacts that the lockdowns have had on children’s education in the last year. For sure, being trapped at home, sometimes with ropey internet connections or devices being shared between several people has been a struggle, whilst socialising has been really difficult – for young children in particular.

But throughout the lockdowns, children’s interest in the natural world doesn’t seem to have waned in any way. Here at the Young People’s Trust for the Environment (YPTE), we’re lucky enough to see some fantastic examples of how primary schools have been able to encourage their children’s interest in the world outdoors, even if they haven’t been able to interact with it as much as they’d have liked to for much of the last year.

In April 2020, soon after the first lockdown began, YPTE began creating a new series of home learning packs to assist teachers in providing children and their parents with some inspiration for finding out together about a wide range of environmental topics while stuck at home. The whole series is available on our website (ypte.org.uk/topics/home-learning-packs) and although, thankfully, the lockdowns are now over, the packs are still fantastic for inspiring kids’ interest in the natural world and for giving parents ideas for things to do with their children during the long summer holidays.

Just recently, I’ve been reviewing some brilliant examples of school-based environmental education from the lockdowns. Take for example, the primary school from a small village on the Scottish borders that had already set up a community recycling facility in the school foyer. With the introduction of Covid restrictions, it was clear that the facility was going to have to close, as the public could no longer go inside the school building. But the children didn’t want to see villagers throwing away items that could under other circumstances be recycled, so they created a video message for the community, in which they asked people to store their

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recycling at home, until the school had sorted out a new home for its recycling facility.

A redundant shed in the school grounds was repurposed as the new recycling facility. So, after the children had brightened it up with some funky new artwork to decorate the exterior, created colourful signage pointing the way and installed some new bins provided by a local community group, the new recycling facility opened up. It’s still being used by the villagers today and will continue into the future as the new community recycling centre. It serves a real need, as it’s there for recycling the items that are generally difficult to recycle elsewhere – things like the plastic cases for glue sticks, toothpaste tubes, crisp packets, cartons and batteries.

Then there’s the primary school in Kent that set up a series of recycling initiatives to reduce waste and put money back into parents’ pockets. The schemes they have set up tackle some of the niggling expenses that any parents of primary school children tend to face nowadays. For example, fancy dress outfits can now

be bought second hand for a fraction of what they cost new in a school fancy dress exchange. Football boots, which children tend to grow out of well before they have worn them out, can also be bought second-hand at very low prices. Second-hand uniforms can be either bought or swapped in an in-school uniform swap-shop. And in one of the most original ventures, packs of reusable party decorations, tablecloths, plates etc. can be hired from the school too.

What’s really great about both of these schools’ projects is that they provide children and families with ways to make a difference in the real world. These aren’t theoretical, textbook ideas. They provide ways to take action that have a positive impact whilst enabling children to learn about how their actions have the power to change the world in a small way – either positively or negatively – every single day.

For example, did you know that here in the UK, we consume around 6 billion metallised, plastic, filmwrapped packs of crisps each year? That’s 16 million bags every day! So, recycling crisp packets makes a lot of sense.

Or that making a pair of trainers or football boots typically creates around 14kg of carbon emissions, with the vast bulk of these emissions arising from the manufacturing process? So, buying them used, but not worn out, is good for the planet as well as the pocket.

Or that around 7 million fancy dress outfits are thrown away each year in the UK alone, and that only a small proportion of these are recycled? Halloween outfits alone create around 2,000 tonnes of plastic waste each year, because they are mostly made from synthetic fibres derived from plastic.

The children from these schools have learned about these issues, found out what they can do to help and have got on and done it! Even in lockdown, the children’s enthusiasm and passion for protecting our planet has remained undiminished, thanks to the guidance and encouragement of their teachers. And that’s something we can all learn from, as we try to ‘build back better’ after the lockdowns.

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GOOD VIBRATIONS

Paula Carnell, Beekeeping Consultant, Writer and Speaker

It has been a real joy to be running the daily ‘bee safaris’ at The Newt again. I had missed the interaction with visitors, and especially the things I learn from the visitors whilst I’m sharing my knowledge of bees. Many of the things that I started to discuss ten years ago, were then considered ‘woo woo’ and nonscientific. I have been delighted, however, as over the past few years, science has caught up, confirming much of what many people instinctively knew to be true. I am also loving how talking with people can fill in the gaps of knowledge we all have, like completing a massive global jigsaw puzzle.

On my safaris, I point out plants that bees love – we’ve been very lucky with some excellent sightings of carder and bumblebees through the spring on bugle, rosemary and now the chives. One of the herbs I like to point out is plantain; on one of my safaris, a fellow beekeeper called it ‘white man’s footprint’, which I’d not heard before. It was related to the North American settlers spreading across the country, with their honeybees (white man’s flies) and the plantain. I was curious as to why plantain, as I had presumed it would have already been present there.

A week or so later, whilst studying one of my herbal medicine textbooks, there was a chapter on the first European settlers and their interactions with the native Americans. The whole history of medicine and pharmacies is a fascinating one, with highly educated academics feeling challenged by the country housewives’ knowledge of herbs. Meanwhile…

apothecaries were marketing expensive exotic medicine blends using minerals and spices combined in complicated and expensive ingredients. The new world was, therefore, not appealing to the academics without its hospitals or means to recoup their many years of university studying. The apothecaries were slow to follow, uncertain of a flourishing market for their goods. There was still a need for medicine of some form and so, many of the new settlers brought their own medicine in the form of plants and seeds. Plantain being one of them. As it seeded, it spread, warning the first peoples of the incoming settlers. I use plantain for bee stings, either straight from the plant, by mashing up a freshly picked leaf and rubbing it on the spot, or after infusing the leaves in olive oil – I mix the oil with beeswax to make a balm.

A previous safari guest sent me the book Overstory by Richard Powers, as many of my tales reminded him of a character in the book. After reading it, I was reminded of the wisdom and importance of trees, and how, when it was first found that trees communicate with each other, the scientist was ridiculed and became isolated. Now it has become accepted that the mycelium growing on the roots of trees connects each specimen in a literal worldwide web. It was this book that helped me realise that it takes 200 years to replace a 200-year-old tree.

Last week, I was sharing the story of ‘Alfred’s cakes’ fungi which grow in abundance in the Stumpery, to find that two of my guests had recently visited the Ice Man Museum in Switzerland where one such cake was found in his pocket to keep his hands warm. Shared wisdom lifts our souls, as we realise more about each other and how simply everything is connected – and usually by bees! I even managed to find that pure rubber flip flops made in Cheddar, Somerset, have a bee connection. As rubber plantations are working hard to gain new customers after the popularity of plastics, there are initiatives to combine beekeeping as the rubber trees are full of blooms rich in nectar and so, an excellent honey source.

When I start talking about vibrations, I often see some raised eyebrows as they’re ready for a spoonful of ‘woo’. For the past four years I have been researching and experimenting with frequencies and vibrations of bees, placing bait hives and colonies on the geopathic stress lines that match the bees’ vibration. After learning of three colonies living together healthily in the roof space of a house, with no signs of disease, plenty of honey, as well as in close proximity – going against all the textbooks – I started delving into the world of ley lines and dowsing.

Back in the 1990s, a beekeeper called Jon Harding had begun looking into why bees preferred different spots, and why some colonies thrived, and others didn’t. Harding came across NASA research following the sicknesses developed by the first astronauts. NASA started working with frequencies, understanding that the Earth had a frequency of 7.68 HTZ and humans one of 60-80HTZ. Without connection to our Earth’s frequency, humans become sick. This goes someway to explain jet-lag, as well as the popular practice of ‘grounding’ and ‘earthing’. NASA adjusted the background frequency of their spacecraft to match that of Earth’s, solving the problem and enabling humans to remain in space indefinitely.

We have evolved to have regular connections with the Earth, to reset our electrical charge. Bees, however, have a frequency of 256 HTZ (confirmed by a bee safari bee scientist). Beekeepers in New Zealand figured out that when there are underground rivers, a new frequency ‘curtain’ is produced that travels from the ground up, into the atmosphere. Interestingly this curtain has a frequency of between 230 and 280 HTZ, creating an area on the same ‘wavelength’ as the bees. This information helped me to decide where to place bait hives for bees across The Newt estate. It was particularly important not to have wayward swarms flying into the buildings as they were being renovated. Hadspen House had a history of bees living in the chimneys - no coincidence I once found that this high frequency curtain ran through the building. If you’d like to step further, frequencies can also be related to emotions, 250 HTZ being neutrality, and what is more neutral than being present – an important skill for any beekeeper. May your summer be spent with those on your ‘wavelength’.

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___________________________________________ Bee Safaris Monday-Friday 3pm-4pm The Newt, Castle Cary Join Paula for a walking tour of The Newt’s rare, native and wild bee colonies. Discover the various hives hidden in the woodland and learn more about their fascinating behaviours. Advanced booking is required. £10 per person. 01963 577777 thenewtinsomerset.com

On Foot THORNCOMBE BEACON

Emma Tabor and Paul Newman

Distance: 2¼ miles Time: Approx 1½ hours Park: Car park at Eype’s Mouth. Pay in the honesty box. Walk Features: An ideal summer walk for an afternoon or early evening, a steady climb up to Thorncombe Beacon, with views along the coast towards Golden Cap and a lovely return section through woodland near Downhouse Farm; there is also a chance to swim at Eype Beach. Refreshments: Downhouse Farm Café Open 10am - 5pm, closed Mondays and Tuesdays

Each month we devise a walk for you to try with your family and friends (including four-legged members) pointing out a few interesting things along the way, be it flora, fauna, architecture, history, the unusual, and sometimes the unfamiliar. For July, we take a relatively easy walk from Eype's Mouth to the top of Thorncombe Beacon with good views in either direction along the coast. On the return there are stunning views towards Golden Cap and some good prospects inland before descending through a magical section of woodland and an easy stroll across fields back to Eype beach. >