Ah, those ‘glorious’ summers of old
However, there are no small tortoiseshells. I wonder if readers have noticed their almost total absence this year.
I also haven’t seen any lizards basking in the sun. Indeed, I’ve seen little sun for lizards to bask in. This summer, the ratio of bright days to dark seems to be about one to four. Sunshine is a rare commodity and even when there is a brief window in which holidaymakers gather on the beach, I see few swimmers in the sea.
The water seems cold for the time of year: there were more bathers in June. I see some Irish mammies pulling wet suits onto their small children. They feel protective, of course. Were we tougher in my childhood? Wet suits were unknown but we swam daily and enthusiastically throughout the summer holidays. Maybe it was in the culture; it was expected of us. There was no question but that the sea would be warm enough to swim in from June until late September.
Within an hour of our arrival in Ballybunion, Youghal or Tramore, we were dashing into the sea, come rain or shine. There was no stopping us, even if the mammies warned us against catching a chill. Indeed, off the promenade in Tramore, the sea on the August Bank Holiday would be crowded with swimmers, holidaymakers and down-for-the-day farmers from Tipperary, heads, necks and arms deeply tanned and the rest of them as white as skinned hard-boiled eggs, jumping into the waves in their football togs. Little did they care what we teenage sophisticates-of-the-strand thought of them.
I took a look at some Met Eireann data. Surprisingly, summer sea temperatures were lower in the years 1961 to 1990 than now (although not surprising in view of global warming). In August 2008, the mean temperature of the Irish Atlantic was 15.1 degrees; between 1961 and 1990, it averaged 14.6. However, these were, of course, those “glorious” summers when, in the recall of anyone old enough to remember them, the sun always shone.
Meanwhile, swimming in the Irish Sea these days can, apparently, expose one to more than the risk of a chill. A Dublin correspondent tells me that the “jackeens” are calling for a seal cull because bathers amongst them have been nipped by over-friendly (or possibly malevolent) seals. She ascribes the cause to the Christmas Puppy Syndrome. Apparently, orphaned seals are regularly rescued and reared by specialist groups. As pups, they are cute and seductive; most are grey seals who only get three weeks of maternal attention before being left to their own devices – left, so to speak, to sink or swim. And they do sink because, in storms, their furry coats become waterlogged and they become too weak to remain afloat.
Some are fortunate enough to be stranded on the shore and found, and taken to seal sanctuaries. They are nurtured and released when fit to survive alone. However, it seems that some Dubliners feed these cute little pups with their big, endearing eyes, and so the seals become quite unafraid of mankind and, indeed, like to nuzzle them or playfully nip them when they enter their element.
As my correspondent reports: “I’ve had many encounters with seals in Ringsend. I admit that I couldn’t but laugh when I saw one arthritic oul’ fella get a miraculous cure and rocket up a ladder when a young seal approached to see if he was in trouble. I can’t blame him, however. I have a healthy respect for the mouths of seals.”
Another aquatic alarm for Dubliners may be the prospect of turtles in the Dodder. A Yellow-bellied Slider, native of Alabama, was recently seen on the Dodder banks. Farmed to be sold as pets, it may not be the only Slider released by an irresponsible owner. Sliders can grow to almost a foot long, are omnivorous and might well threaten native species were they to become established.
Alien turtles and alien mink. And to think that back in the era of those “glorious” summers, anglers and sportsmen with cinders in their wellingtons scoured river banks to kill otters and “protect” salmon stocks.
It beggars belief.
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