"Ticks have found a way to get around the immune system"

We all know that Sooz is not a fan of ticks. I was surprised when she sent me an article recently about  research underway. New medicines may be developed that build on the survival techniques employed by the lowly tick.

It's quite an interesting article. It doesn't make me like ticks any better, but perhaps I will respect them a bit more.

Beavers in Stockholm

National Geographic magazine recently published an article about the rise of beavers in Stockholm. It's worth a read.

I had not known that beavers were last seen in the capital in the 1790's. In fact, beavers were declared extinct in the whole country in 1871.

Thankfully, they were successfully reintroduced in the 1920's, and within the past decade, they've made their way to the big city.

I'm pretty sure they won't make it out to the archipelago, however. At least, I hope not, since my house is made entirely of wood!

Webcam action...

Spotted last night. I love that my phone in Texas can alert me that something is walking by our house in Aspö!

Bird Identification

I enjoyed reading about a new project at Cornell University. Their Lab of Ornithology has an extensive online resource about birds. Sooz knew all about it, but it is new to me!

We have a couple of good birding books at the stuga, one from Margaret, and another from Anette. Sooz is usually in charge of identifying the birds we see,and our books have come in handy.

Being a bit of a tech geek myself, I came across Cornell's Merlin project through a tech website. It's essentially facial recognition for birds. Upload a good photo of a bird, and it will analyze the image to determine what kind of bird it is. Very cool. Soon enough this technology will be in an iPhone app, and all I'll have to do is point and I'll know the name of our little neighbors!

The website mentions "North American" birds, but I think we'll give it a try anyways. Perhaps it can identify Northern European birds, too.

Moose Hunting!

Let's be honest. The real reason I have a camera at our stuga is to catch a picture of our moose. I'm happy to report that today is the big day:

She (or he) came walking by my dropcam about 4:20AM Aspö time, hence the night-vision.

Don't worry, I won't fill the blog with random webcam images, although I will always share moose video!

The Wild Kingdom

I've been playing with a Dropcam at my home in Texas. It is a teriffic little webcam; easy to setup, simple to access over the internet, and it has great picture and sound quality as well.

I took it to the stuga on my last trip and set it up on the deck when we left. I had paid for a month of mobile broadband, so I've been able to watch its view from Texas over the past few days. One of Dropcam's best features is its recording service. I'm able to go back and watch the past week's worth of activity to find any action the camera might pick up.

Most days, I just see passing clouds and swaying trees. We do like listening to the birdsongs, though. It is fun to turn up the volume on my iMac and hear the Aspö birdies chirping away.

What I really want to do is catch the moose on my camera, but I don't think the moose are in the neighborhood. I have, however, seen a few of the little red deer walking around most mornings. I've shared a clip of our visitors from this morning.

I don't know if I will leave the camera out while we're away for the winter. Once I have permanent broadband connectivity, I certainly will have a camera (or two). But for now, at least, it is fun to have a real-time glimpse, even if it is just on a screen.

A day in the (good) life.....

It's a first for me: home alone on Aspö. Lots of time for contemplating my navel and....putzing. Which I am very good at, I might add.

But I have actually done something constructive: I painted (finished painting the 2nd half of) the guest house/little house/Love Shack on the inside, a brilliant white-white. I am thinking I need to paint the window frames a different color,just for fun. Maybe a nice light turquoise?

Then I cleared brush and set things up so that Grant may do a nice fire when he's here next week.

I just came in from a walkabout since it's a clear and warm day and ran into Tony and a very nice lady named Birgitta. We puzzled over a broken tree and how to possibly retrieve the broken part: it's wedged in at the very top, about 50-60 feet up. Hmm. Nothing decided on that one. Stay tuned for developments.

Now as I sit here, I am watching the tiniest of ticks stroll across my hand. Hmm. How can we remotely protect ourselves in the face of such a minute enemy? Sigh.

But no time for worrying about that. I need to concentrate on getting a glimpse of "my" moose and hope to hear the nightingale again tonight....

Webcams

I really get a kick out of looking at webcams around the world. I have two on this blog, a Sandhamn camera run by Waxholmsbolaget, and a Stavsnäs cam run by a resident in the apartments next to the local ICA. I also have a couple of my own in our house in Texas to keep an eye on Ollie.

To be honest, I would love to have a webcam out on Aspö so I could keep an eye on the house, to see the weather first-hand, and maybe to catch a moose snapshot or two. I found a blog run by a gentleman who owns land in Wales, and set up a solar-powered webcam to upload regular pictures onto his website. To be honest, I have been looking at it most every day.

For me, it'd be easier to set something like this up. I at least have electric power, rather then relying on a solar cell as this gentleman has to. I would have to keep my internet connection on full-time, so I'd be paying about 200kr a month while I am away, so that would add up.

The biggest thing keeping me from doing this, though, is the distance. It seems pretty certain that during the months I am away, something would stop working.
And therein lies the problem. If I set up a webcam and it stopped working, that would drive me crazy. I would be far better off not having it in the first place.

Birdhouses

I found a website with a bunch of cool modernish birdhouses. They are also pretty pricey but it gave me the idea to perhaps make one of my own. I have plenty of scrap wood and I might give it a go.

What we really would like to do is to make a bat house; we've seen a few bats on Aspö and they're threatened in Sweden. I looked into plans and kits but that seems a more complicated project than I'm willing to get into right now. I'll give a birdhouse a try for starters!

A new wildlife sighting!

We knew there were bats on the island but we just got to see one close up. Sooz picked up her boots off the deck this afternoon and hiding underneath was a tiny little bat! He seemed a bit slow- moving but not injured (or rabid) so I scooped him up in a plant pot and took him downhill to the woods. He scampered up a bush and immediately hung upside-down. How cute!

We like bats in our family. Grant had a teacher who was crazy about them so he learned more than a usual amount on the subject in school. They also eat lots of mosquitoes, which makes them all right in my book.

"The snow may have saved the ticks from the cold"

Found this disappointing news on the SVT website as I was trolling Eurovision clips:

Many hope that the cold will kill ticks and snails. However, insects are safe in the ground and waiting for spring in the insulating blanket of snow lying over the country.

In recent years, mild winters have been favorable for these creatures that many fear. But, to many people's chagrin, not even the cold of winter kills ticks and snails. Lars-Ake Janzon, biologist of the Museum of Natural History, says he gets many calls from people asking if the cold is killing those creatures.

"The snow insulates against the cold, those who were in the ground before the snow came will likely be safe", he says.

In December the whole country was covered with snow, and inland regions are hoping their tick plague may be mitigated in the summer.

"Frozen ticks have managed to keep alive for six years. They are survivors who found their own niche in the wild, "says Lars-Ake Janzon.

Darn.

The Moose did it!

Marg sent along a story about a woman who was found dead in unexplained circumstances in southern Sweden. It turns out, after long investigation, than the woman was killed by a moose.

This is tragic, of course, for the woman and her family. It's also a bit of vindication for Margaret, as she has quizzed Janne and Tony repeatedly about the best way to deal with the danger posed by moose on Aspö. The menfolk always told her not to worry, the moose is more scared of you than you are of it, there's no danger at all, don't worry about it, etc., etc.

Still, there's no significant risk for island residents. As the story's expert puts it, “We’re not aware of any similar case in the world.”

UPDATE: More moose news yesterday.

Another moose sighting!

Marg writes in this evening:

"Janne and Cal just finished up a boys weekend out on Aspö; they were 8 or 9 guys in total, great time.

The attached photo was taken by Ronnie during the weekend, when they had an unexpected visitor - hoping for an invitation to join the boys I guess!"

Moose!

Near Marg & Janne's house on our way for dinner, we heard something crashing in the woods nearby. Sooz went to investigate, and whispered back to me, "moose!"

I opened my camera and took a few shots of the moose, who was about 25 yards away, looking straight at us. This is the best one of the bunch; I enhanced it a bit. No antlers, but it seemed pretty big, so I'm guessing a mama moose.

We had a great dinner afterwards; no moose meat, but röding on the grill instead. Delicious.

MOOSE!!

Old eagle eye (Grant) spotted a MOOSE walking by our big window just now. Our first sighting!! We were all so excited-and luckily Ollie was inside. She just strolled past in the dim light-as big as a horse- about 15 feet from us, just off the deck. She paused and looked at us (while we frantically tried to get a picture, alas unsuccessfully) and continued on up the hill.

It's been a big day in the wildlife department: first our resident pheasant came squawking by this morning, then a deer (A Buck? It had horns) ran up the hill around 6P and now this.
Very cool!!

Beehive

Uh-oh. This was on the deck. We think it was blown off by the stormy winds, which is good, maybe they will be deterred from making another.

The Longest Day

...not D-Day, but the actual longest day of the year in the northern hemisphere. (It's also my grandmother's birthday, but I digress).

It was a beautiful day today, clear, still, and sunny. We put jarn vitriol on the house, or should I say Rutger did. He loves painting, so he ran the sprayer and I masked the windows and doors. That stuff is insidious, though, just a drop turns the wood grey. We have a few drips in places they shouldn't be, so I will have to do a few touch-ups.

Willie comes tomorrow to finish up and I hope the big jobs will be done then so I can chill out over the upcoming week.

On a totally different note, I can tell there are many more people here during midsummer; there are voices all over from the paths and docks which I haven't heard before. It's still quite secluded, though.

UPDATE: More photos just posted on the web gallery.
UPDATE 2: Just saw a big owl fly by. Marcia says they're rare to see these days. She and Sooz also saw a snake earlier, which Ollie missed completely.

Fencing

My favourite feature of the house is the big front deck that thrusts out over the rock. The problem is that it's about 4-5 feet high, and if someone were to take a spill off the edge, it would be pretty serious. The risk is even higher for visiting children and dogs, too. (Especially squirrel-chasing corgis with surgically-repaired backs.)

I really want to keep the deck unobstructed but I also think it's prudent to have something that protects the edge when we have guests.

From my time living in Dallas, I saw many removable mesh pool fences, like the one pictured above. They are on poles which fit into the ground and are kept under tension to keep kids out of the pool. The big advantage is they can be easily pulled out and rolled up, so we can keep the deck clear between visitors and parties.

I'm talking to a couple of fence providers in the US and UK; my thought is to attach brackets at the edge of the deck and insert the poles there, so everything stays flush and out of the way when the fence is removed.

Vaccine

Got my TBE shot today; the NHS had to special-order as it's not a normal item here in the UK. Also it cost £35, which is bit of a bummer since each of need three shots to be fully protected. Do the math for three of us and it's not cheap.

It's cheaper than having encephalitis, however!

We'll get our second shot before we go in October, and the final one before next summer.

Wille-gram for Mongo!

Willie called with a few updates:

• He saw the mother moose and baby about 5 meters from our deck this morning!
• The little house is half-up; Mikael will be there tomorrow to help lift the remaining pieces. (I'm impressed Wille got that far by himself!)
• He's been reading about the järn vitrol, which is still my favored way to treat the house. He said that letting the house weather on its own for a season and then applying the coat makes for a better result. I will have to check into that; I could just protect the trim, and let the house go gray on its own. But to do that, I'll have to get rid of all the glue drips. Wille will leave me a scraper of the type Stefan recommends.

In other news:

• Marcia went to IKEA and they told her it would be ten weeks for the countertops, not five as I understood. If so, that's a real drag; I had hoped to get the whole kitchen done when we were there in October. Sooz will have to get the whole story next week when she makes the final order.
• Rutger is calling daily with more ideas for the kitchen, he's not too keen on having a cabinet with the extractor fan, he says it's poor storage and not very good looking. He prefers the hood.
• And I got an email from Andrew, with the Fireorb company in Chicago. The good news is that the price hasn't changed since we last corresponded a year ago. He's also a Cubs fan which is a great reason to do business with him.

(There's an inside joke in the title, bonus points for anyone who answers it in the comments.)