RIP New Normal


I don't know how historians of the future will look back on the current period of time and how they will analyse it. What will they make of our species knowingly engineering an environmental breakdown, of the cover-ups, the denials, the greed? My fear is of a dystopian future, the obscenely rich and powerful living behind heavily protected barriers where new technologies and limitless money can stave-off the worst of the deprivations that the vast majority of the population suffer. I used to think that 'climate change' was going to be fed to us as a gradual process, the hotter summers, windier frontal systems and heavier rain incremental and slowly accepted. But not now. These life-threatening increases in temperature; the alarming melting of ice-caps, glaciers and permafrost; flash floods and landslides that are not generational events but are now annual ones - I haven't even mentioned crop failure, water insecurity and societal breakdown. There is no 'new normal' any longer because nothing stays stable long enough to be considered normal. At times it can seem pointless to 'do your bit' to help the planet, but the alternative is what exactly? Do nothing? Leave it up to a team of scientists to invent some machine that will reverse our destabilisation of the planet? No, we can all act responsibly, make small choices that, if replicated by tens of millions of others can make a small difference. Many small differences can make substantial ones. Wishful thinking maybe. I will continue to walk when I can and not drive; not fly; not consume for the sake of consuming; not waste; live responsibly within my means; think of others. 


Heatwave Number 3 is now upon us, and we have had more days in a single year where the temperature has been above 34C - eight days to be precise - and it is only early July. This is uncharted territory for the  UK. With such sobering thoughts swimming around my heat-fuddled brain I slapped on the Factor 30 and walked up onto Epsom Downs to just see how the butterflies were faring. Numbers were OK, but not heaving. Most of the Marbled Whites were probably over and Gatekeepers only just beginning but I managed to get a decent counts in, highlights being: 500 Gatekeeper, 125 Chalkhill Blue (above), 100 Marbled White, 70 Meadow Brown, 12 Dark Green Fritillary, 1 Silver-washed Fritillary and a Clouded Yellow (only my second this year, photos show it backlit and in full sun, below).


Vegetation was crisped, with a few straggly Round-headed Rampions (below) still on show but little else, so it was quite a surprise to come across two fields close to NoHome Farm that were full of colour, mainly Wild Carrot, Common Ragwort and White Melilot (top picture). We have got this hot weather well into next week (currently 'cooling down" to 28-30C - not that long ago these would have been exceptional temperatures!) It is almost dreamlike at the moment. Too warm to sleep well overnight, wandering out into the already muggy garden at 05.00hrs to check the moth trap, watching the world carrying on as if nothing is up - football World Cups and Grand Prixs with the attendant circus flying in from all four corners of the world, Tour de France being cycled in obscene temperatures; war games being played out for real, affecting lives in so many ways. Enjoy 2026 because from now on in the climate will do nothing but get more erratic and damaging. I hope I'm wrong.

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